


War of Shadows

by HonorH



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types, The Heroes of Olympus - Rick Riordan, The Trials of Apollo - Rick Riordan
Genre: Celtic Mythology & Folklore, Happy ending don't worry, Heavy Angst, M/M, Minor Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-08
Updated: 2017-02-02
Packaged: 2018-08-20 05:10:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 45,691
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8237252
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HonorH/pseuds/HonorH
Summary: Six years ago, Nico di Angelo disappeared, leaving Will Solace with a broken heart and no answers. Now, Nico has reappeared, badly wounded and covered in tattoos, and Will has even more questions than he started with.





	1. Six Years Gone

**Author's Note:**

> So, I started having this idea before two of my favorite authors (Hello, Gates_of_Ember and Aelys_Althea) went and wrote stories about Nico disappearing and then reappearing, but I was apparently slow to the party. Hope there are still nibbles on the table for me.
> 
> This is a standalone fic with no, repeat, no connection to my "Being Us" series, which will hopefully be getting a third part soon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I recently did minor surgery on this. A reader pointed out a plot hole created by Dawn's nanny, a dryad named Cherry. As a dryad, Cherry would've been attached to one location, and I needed her to move around. Thus, Cherry the dryad has become Sela the cloud nymph. Everything else (except a few small errors and a couple of places where I felt the wording could be better) is the same.

Six years ago, Nico di Angelo had disappeared, leaving Will Solace with endless questions and a broken heart. Six years, with nothing but a two-word note, vague rumors and scattered sightings to show for it.

Six years had been enough time for Will to complete a course of study in healing in New Rome, and then to establish himself as head of the infirmary at Camp Half-Blood. It had been enough time for him to hit a number of personal milestones. It had been, he thought, enough time to get over losing his first love.

But now, as he stood, stock-still, looking down at Nico’s unconscious, badly-wounded body, Will realized that no, it hadn’t. Every emotion he’d felt as a heartbroken seventeen-year-old came flooding back.

“He appeared, just appeared out of nowhere, he killed the monster, and then he collapsed. Look at his hands, they’re fading. What’s wrong with him, Will? Will?”

The voice penetrated the fog around Will’s brain. “Marko, get some unicorn draught and nectar. Maya, I need scissors. Prep for surgery, both of you.”

Marko and Maya Orante, the sixteen-year-old, twin co-senior counselors of the Apollo cabin, leaped to their duties. Will shoved all his emotions into a box, labeled it “To be dealt with later,” and set about saving Nico’s life. Questions could wait; wounds couldn’t. Nico had two deep gashes on his torso and one on his left thigh, as well as a number of more minor injuries. Will didn’t even need to touch him to tell that he’d overextended himself with his powers, too; darkness boiled under his skin, causing his extremities to fade. One of his shoes fell off.

“What have you done to yourself, Nico?” Will murmured.

Maya returned with the scissors. Will stripped off Nico’s jacket and cut away his black shirt. Marko brought the unicorn draught and poured a little into his mouth, then helped Will strip off Nico’s sword belt and shoes and cut away his black jeans as well. Then the three of them started to close his wounds.

Will registered, as he worked, that Nico was covered in tattoos. Once the final stitches were in place and his wounds were bandaged, Will looked his former boyfriend over. The tattoos were strange, like thorns, or perhaps bare branches, all in black, with small symbols among them. When Will took a look at Nico’s back, it fell into place.

Brushing Nico’s hair to one side, Will discovered the sigil of Hades inked on the back of Nico’s neck. Radiating out from it were . . . cracks. Like Nico’s skin was shattering to reveal the darkness underneath. The cracks spread all over his back, his arms, and were encroaching on his torso.

And at the point of every crack was a symbol. There seemed to be no rhyme nor reason to them. Will recognized the signs of several Greek and Roman gods – Apollo, Athena, Venus, Mars, Ares – and also some astrological symbols. There were symbols from other pantheons, too: Egyptian, Norse, Hindu. Symbols of several religions – a Christian cross, a Star of David, a pentagram, a Buddha – were scattered over his skin. Will spotted Native American iconography and a few animals. And then there were things Will had no idea what to make of. Runes, strange glyphs, a clock, an atom, a crown, a spade. They went on and on. Will counted at least forty of them.

And right over Nico’s heart, larger than any of the other symbols, was a stylized sun.

What did it all mean?

With Nico unconscious, there was no way to know. The important thing, for the moment, was to help him to recover.

“His hand is still fading,” said Maya.

“Get me some of that muck Coach Hedge makes, will you?” Will asked. “And Marko, go down to the Hecate cabin and tell Willa I need to talk to her. While you’re at it . . . tell Chiron that Nico di Angelo has returned.” The twins gawked at him. “Do it.”

Maya and Marko cleared out, and Will looked down at Nico again. He pressed the fingers of his right hand against Nico’s forehead and his left hand against the base of Nico’s throat. Reaching out with his healer’s senses, he looked for any other injuries or illnesses he hadn’t detected before.

What he found was that Nico was a mess of old injuries. Bones that had been broken and then healed, old stab wounds – some, startlingly enough, made with Celestial bronze or Imperial gold – scar tissue in his right shoulder consistent with repetitive-use injury, and above all, so much darkness swirling in his system that by all rights, he should have faded entirely.

Will opened his eyes. There were scars all over Nico’s body. Some ran through his tattoos; others had been tattooed over. There were two on his face. One was up near the hairline on the left side of his face. The other ran across his right cheek and marred his upper lip.

What the hell had happened to him? Will looked at his clothing and the items they’d taken off him, trying to find answers. There wasn’t much. His wallet held a black credit card Will recognized as the one Hades had issued to him for emergencies, as well as a smattering of currency: American and Canadian dollars, euros, yen and Mexican pesos.

Nico’s sword, which he’d been holding when he had appeared outside camp, had been brought in. Joining it on his sword belt were two daggers. One was Celestial bronze. The other . . .

It was tempered steel, of modern make. It was honed to a razor’s edge and, judging by the scratches and nicks on the blade, had seen action.

The sight of it gave Will a bad feeling. He knew there were non-Greek monsters out there that could only be killed with cold iron, but Nico’s Stygian iron sword could easily take care of those. Why would he need a steel dagger?

For that matter, why did he need the Celestial bronze dagger? Nico had already been an expert swordsman by the time he was fourteen. He’d never needed another weapon. Judging by the hard muscles in his arms and shoulders, he hadn’t exactly slacked off on his sword drill.

Will looked at Nico again, letting the clinical part of his brain fade into the background. In spite of the scars that marred it, his face was even more beautiful than it had been when they were both teens. In repose, he was angelic, as he’d always been. He was still slim, lean, but he’d added even more muscle to his frame. His hair was longer, and he had a silver skull earring in one ear.

Six years. Six years had gone by since he had disappeared. Why had he gone? Why had he stayed away, with no contact with anyone, even Hazel, for all those years? What had happened to him in that time? Why was he back now?

The questions were piling up, and Will had no answers.

Maya returned with Coach Hedge’s nature-magic muck, and Will began applying it, trying to focus on his job rather than the hurricane of emotions bearing down on him. The muck smelled awful, but it was an effective treatment for magical overreach; Will had used it on a number of children of Hecate over the years, and he knew that Coach Hedge had once brought Nico back from the brink of nonexistence with it.

That had been, what, eight years earlier? It seemed like forever.

“So . . . this is Nico di Angelo?” Maya asked, her voice uncharacteristically tentative. Nico was somewhere between a myth and a legend at camp.

“The one and only,” said Will. “And that’s the extent of the answers I have about him at the moment. He seems to be comatose at the moment, which has happened before when he’s overused his shadow magic.”

As Will finished with the muck, Marko ran back into the infirmary. “Willa’s gathering her stuff. She should be here soon. Chiron wants a meeting once we’re sure he’s stable.”

“Yeah,” Will muttered. “I’d imagine he would.”

“What do you think it means, that he’s back?” Maya asked.

“I have literally no idea at all.” Will wiped his hands. “Once Willa does her thing, Chiron can have his meeting. Marko, I’d like you to stay here with him, though.”

Marko nodded. He and Maya split their senior-counselor duties. He was a natural healer, much like Will, and was Will’s chief lieutenant in the infirmary. Maya, who was more outgoing and a natural leader, performed most of the day-to-day duties in the Apollo cabin.

The twins were Guamanian by birth. They were both a little on the short side, with dark, straight hair, brown eyes, light-brown skin and freckles. Marko was quiet and intense, but also good-natured and kind. Maya was open and charismatic, and her natural expression was a bright smile. They were both artistic and athletic, though Marko fell more to the artistic and Maya to the athletic.

They’d entered Camp Half-Blood during Will’s last year as senior counselor. It wasn’t a year he was fond of reflecting on, as it had been the first year after Nico had disappeared. Will had been distracted by trying to find any lead as to his boyfriend’s whereabouts, though he did try his best to do right by his siblings. Nonetheless, he couldn’t say the two had made much of an impression on him then. In their defense, very little had.

Upon his return, though, they had definitely made an impression, and a good one. He liked and trusted them both, and he knew the Apollo cabin was in good hands so long as they were the senior counselors. Judging by the chaos currently happening in his brain, Will would need all the help he could get in the coming days.

Will’s eyes were drawn, yet again, back to Nico. He remembered the last time they’d been together.

***

A week shy of Nico’s seventeenth birthday, he’d caught Will outside the Apollo cabin one morning.

“My dad contacted me last night,” Nico said without preamble. “He said he needs me for something happening in the mortal world. Said he hopes it can be handled with diplomacy.”

“And, let me get this straight, he wants you to be diplomatic?” Will asked. “Has he ever met you?”

Nico snorted. “You’re still alive. That should say something about my diplomatic abilities.”

“More like mine.”

“Dork.”

“Other dork.”

Nico pulled him close and kissed him. “I’ll see you soon.”

Will caught his hand before he could go. “How long will this take? Because . . .”

“I don’t know.” Nico looked a touch disgruntled. “Hopefully not long. I’ll let you know as soon as I know. But even if it’s more than a week . . . we can still have our date, right?”

Will’s heart sped up. They’d decided to wait until they were both seventeen to become intimate. And on Nico’s birthday, they were planning a date that would, if all went well, end up at a hotel.

“No, it’s got to be that night, or I’m taking my penis and going home.” Will grinned at the blush that overtook Nico’s face. He loved that he could do that. “Of course we can, you goof.”

“You’re impossible,” Nico murmured, and kissed him again. “But I guess I’ll have sex with you, anyway.”

Will pressed his forehead to his boyfriend’s. “I’ll see you when you get back. I love you.”

“I love you, too.”

One last kiss, and Nico was gone, disappearing into the shadow of the Apollo cabin . . .

***

Three days later, Nico had Iris-messaged, saying the job was getting complicated, and not to expect him for another week, at the very least. He said he couldn’t talk about it, but he’d be in touch again soon.

Two weeks later, Will woke to a note in Nico’s distinctive penmanship: “Forgive me.”

Will still had that note.

He pulled himself back to the present, sitting around the pool table with Chiron and the heads of most of the cabins. Brighid Mortensen, an Ares child with blazing red hair and even more blazing blue eyes who was intensely proud of her Celtic/Norse heritage, was describing Nico’s arrival just outside of camp.

“That was when another hellhound appeared,” she was saying. “Di Angelo was right on its tail, literally, and he took it and the other two down in about three seconds flat before he collapsed.”

“I can’t believe he’s back,” said Harley, the only one of the senior counselors who’d personally known Nico. It would be doubtful that Nico would recognize him, though, as Harley had gone from a cute little ten-year-old to a sixteen-year-old roughly the size and shape of an NFL linebacker in in Nico’s absence.

“How is he right now, Will?” Chiron asked.

“He’s . . . medically, he’s stable. We have some sun lamps on him, and Coach Hedge’s muck is keeping him solid.” Will fiddled with his pen. “He’s in a coma right now. He overextended himself with his powers; I’m hoping Willa’s little intervention can keep it from getting any worse.” He nodded gratefully at Willa Henderson, head Hecate counselor, who was looking tired and drinking a cup of tea that smelled like lawn clippings. “But honestly, Chiron, he looks like he’s been fighting a war. I don’t know any other way to describe it. He’s a mess of old and new injuries. If you can, I’d like you to take a look at him, because I just . . . don’t understand all that I’m seeing.”

Jules LeFleur, the Aphrodite head counselor, had focused a piercing gaze on Will. He was seventeen and truly beautiful, with eyes that changed color the way Piper’s always had. Will never discussed his relationship with Nico – the subject was too painful – though a few campers had been there long enough to have known about it. Jules wasn’t one of those, but Will was unwilling to bet that he didn’t know that Will and Nico had been in love, once.

“How dangerous is he, exactly?” asked Sophia Alotaibi, head Athena counselor. Her dark coloring made her storm-gray eyes even more striking.

Will bristled, wanting to smack her down for speaking of Nico like that, but he realized just as quickly that the question was not only sensible, but Will couldn’t answer it. He had no idea what had happened to Nico in the last six years, or what it had done to him.

“Nico’s power is on a level with Percy Jackson’s or Jason Grace’s,” said Chiron. Both demigods made regular visits to the camp, and all the campers were familiar with them and held them in a kind of awe. “While he was at Camp Half-Blood, he had authority over the dead, could shadow-travel, had at least some geomancy, and could control his dreams and even the dreams of others better than anyone except children of Hypnos.”

“I remember he could hold his own against anybody with a sword, too, and that included Percy and Jason. And pretty much the whole Ares cabin,” said Harley.

Brighid scowled. “Is that so?”

“Look, right now, Nico’s not in any shape to be fighting anybody,” Will said, cutting in. “I don’t disagree that keeping an eye on him is a good idea. I intend to do so personally. We’ve got him in a private room right now, which is where he’ll stay.” Will eyed Mark German, the Hermes head counselor. “It would be a very bad idea for any unauthorized personnel to sneak in.”

Mark gave him a cheeky grin. “Now, why would you look at me when you say that? I’m hurt, Will, I’m deeply hurt.” Brighid rolled her eyes and beaned Mark with an Oreo. “Don’t be hatin’, Red.”

Chiron cleared his throat. “Back to the subject at hand, Rachel, do you have anything to add?”

Rachel Elizabeth Dare had been sitting quietly in her chair, looking pensive. “Not at the moment. I’ll go back to my cave and see what happens, though. I can’t help but feel that . . . that Nico’s return is important.”

There was more discussion, but Will tuned it out. When the meeting broke, he was up and out of the room before anybody else, heading back to the infirmary.

Rachel caught up with him. They’d become good friends over the course of the Whole Apollo Thing back in the day.

“How are you doing, Will?” she asked. Rachel wasn’t interested in romance for herself, being dedicated to her position as the Pythia, but she was sensitive to the relationships of others.

“I could not even tell you,” said Will. He slowed his pace. “I’ve got more questions every second, and absolutely no answers, not until he wakes up, at least. And . . . I don’t know if I’m looking forward to hearing what he has to say.”

Rachel set one hand on his arm. “You two really loved each other. I don’t know why he left, but I’m sure it wasn’t because he wanted to.”

Somehow, knowing that didn’t help. “I’m not sure that doesn’t make it worse, at least for him. Rachel, he looks like he’s been through a war. Another one. What’s it done to him?”

She nodded. “I know what you mean.”

“Seeing, him, it was like . . . like he just left. All those emotions I was left with came right back. I’m supposed to be objective, but I don’t know if I can be. Not with him.”

Rachel hugged him. “Just be careful, Will. A lot can change in six years.”

Will hugged her back. Movement caught the corner of his eye, and he saw a young cloud nymph named Sela coming his way, carrying a one-year-old baby girl with blond curls. The knot in his gut softened a little.

“She just woke up from her nap,” said Sela, handing the child to him.

Will took her in his arms. “How’s my girl? How’s my Dawn?” he murmured.

Dawn gave him a huge, baby-toothed grin. “Da!”

He kissed her, loving the smell of her hair, and sighed softly. “You’re right, Rachel. A lot can change in six years.”

***

Will spent the next twenty-four hours barely sleeping, splitting his time between the infirmary and the little cottage he shared with Dawn and her nymph nanny. In the end, it paid off.

About a day and a half after Nico’s dramatic entrance to Camp Half-Blood, he finally woke up, and Will was there.

It was easy for a medic like Will to tell when Nico woke. His breathing changed, though he didn’t move or open his eyes. Will stayed as still and silent as he could, watching and waiting.

After about a minute, Nico opened his eyes. He quickly scanned the area within his immediate viewing field. His eyes caught on Will and stopped. For a good minute, neither man moved or spoke.

Nico was the one who broke the stalemate, with a single word:

“Fuck.”


	2. Apollo's Legacy and Death's Angel

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will is dissatisfied with Nico's choice of conversation openers; the Oracle has a prophecy; Dawn's parentage is revealed; Will witnesses something that disturbs him; Nico goes on a dream journey and gets all the answers he didn't want, and he makes a request of Will.

All of Will’s clamoring emotions coalesced into annoyance.

“Really, Nico?” he asked. “Six years, and that’s what you’re going to open with? No ‘Hi, Will, been a while’ or even ‘Hey, dude, who the hell are you’ or even, ‘I can’t believe I’m back in this shithole’?”

Nico’s face betrayed mild irritation, but nothing else. “I have to go.” He tried to sit up.

Will made to push him back down, a reflex honed by years of dealing with stubborn idiots from the Ares and Nike cabins, but his hand was batted aside by Nico, moving with the speed of a striking snake.

“Don’t touch me.”

It stung. Once upon a time, Will had been one of the few people with _carte blanche_ to touch Nico. One of the even fewer whose touch Nico actively sought out.

Will swallowed the hurt, forced himself to regard Nico as a patient, not an ex-boyfriend. “Look, I know your pain tolerance is insanely high, but a day ago, we spent a lot of time and effort to keep your insides on the inside, and I’d appreciate it if you didn’t rip out your stitches just yet. Speaking of which, here.” Will proffered a piece of ambrosia.

After a moment, Nico took it, being careful not to let his fingers graze Will’s skin. Will set a bottle of unicorn draught next to him.

“While you’re at it, keep drinking this. There’s so much darkness in your system I’m frankly shocked that you haven’t faded away by now.”

“I can handle more than I did back when you knew me.” Nico’s voice was gravelly and quiet, similar to how it had always sounded, but somehow harder.

_Back when you knew me . . ._

It was another stab to the gut, but this time, Will caught something in the subtext. Nico was deliberately pushing him away, the way he’d pushed people away before the Gaea War. Back then, he’d been protecting what he’d believed was a shameful secret.

What was he protecting now?

“Well, I still know you well enough to realize you’re going to try to shadow-travel away at the earliest opportunity, so I’ve taken steps,” said Will.

Nico looked under the sheet covering his body. “Where are my clothes?” Will had furnished him with a set of orange Camp Half-Blood pajama bottoms. He knew for a fact Nico hated orange.

“That’s one step. Also, they were shredded and soaked with blood. Not a good look for you at all.”

“My weapons?” This time, there was a hint of anxiety in Nico’s voice.

Will opened a small foot locker. “Safely stored away. Not that you need to be doing any swordfighting. I also took the liberty of calling in the head counselor of the Hecate cabin. Her name’s Willa, amusingly enough. Take a look at your right palm.”

Nico did so. His brow creased, and he turned it toward Will. Stained into his skin was a complex, circular figure. “What’s this?”

“It’s called an inhibitor ring. It interferes with magic. Willa used her cabin’s proprietary henna blend to make it. That means it’ll stick around for, oh, about a month, during which time you’re grounded. Forcibly.” Will let that sink in.

Nico’s head fell back to the pillow, and he swore in three languages, only two of which Will understood. It was enough for him to get the point. “I can’t stay here for a month!”

“Why not?”

That question seemed to cause Nico to clam up again. Will waited, and after the silence had stretched from “awkward” to “excruciating,” sighed, and began to speak in the most measured tone he could manage.

“I don’t know where you’ve been or what you’ve been doing over the past six years, Nico. But I’ve seen your scars and felt your injuries, and I think I’m on safe ground in speculating that it wasn’t exactly fun.” Nico didn’t move or change his expression. “What I do know is that you were badly injured when you got here. You lost a lot of blood. And while you may have a higher tolerance for your shadow magic than you used to, the darkness in your system is at dangerous levels, much worse than it was after Gaea. It took you more than half a year to be able to shadow-travel without knocking yourself out afterward, remember? As a doctor, I have to consider what’s best for you, and right now, that’s rest. The good thing is that Willa’s inhibitor ring will keep you from accidentally using your abilities during a nightmare.”

“I haven’t had a nightmare in a long, long time,” Nico said dully. Something about his voice, about the utter hopelessness in it, made Will shiver.

He had to ask. “Nico, where have you been all this time? What’s happened to you?” Nico said nothing and continued to stare off into space. Will felt frustration giving way to anger. “How about I start? After I found that note you dropped off, I spent the better part of a year frantically searching for you. Hazel and all your friends helped.”

At the mention of Hazel, Nico went rigid. “Have you told her I’m here?”

“No. At the moment, knowledge of your existence is pretty much confined to Camp Half-Blood. I wanted to wait until you were conscious before calling her.”

“Don’t. Don’t tell anyone.”

“Why?”

“Just don’t!” For the first time, Nico raised his voice. “I swear, Will, if she or any of my old friends shows up, I will leave. On foot, if I have to.”

Will shook his head. “I don’t understand.”

Nico breathed out a long breath, looking into the distance again. “You don’t have to.”

It was like talking to a wall, and it made Will angry again. “Well, moving on, after a year of no luck, the others persuaded me to move to New Rome and pursue a degree in the healing arts. We kept looking, but aside from rumors and a few possible sightings, no one could find out anything.” No reaction. Will went on. “Annabeth finally spotted you in New York. You probably remember. If not, let me refresh you: She saw you on the East Side, outside an older building. The two of you made eye contact. And then you stepped into a shadow and disappeared.”

Will waited to see if there was any reaction from Nico’s quarter. There wasn’t. “After that, we all pretty much knew that you were staying away by choice. Still didn’t know why, but at least we knew you were alive.” Will sighed. “I decided I had to move on. Started dating, even had a nice boyfriend for a while.” There was no reaction to that, either, and it hurt worse than anything. “It ran its course, I finished my degree, and I came back here last year.”

He decided to leave out everything concerning Dawn. That wasn’t something he was ready to tell Nico about until he knew whether he could trust this version of the boy he’d once loved. And not knowing if he could trust Nico? That hurt most of all.

Nico continued to say nothing. Will sighed. “Anyway, I’ll be in and out, and so will a few of my best medics. Try not to frighten them too much. This room has an ensuite behind that door, but I’d suggest you use this.” Will put a portable urinal on the bedside table. “Try to rest. Dinner’s in about an hour.”

He was almost out of the room when Nico’s voice stopped him. “The others . . . how are they?”

It was the one encouraging sign Will had found. “Percy and Annabeth got married. He said he wanted you to be his best man, but since you weren’t there, Jason was. They have a little boy now, Robert Luke Chase-Jackson. Jason and Piper are also married, and she’s ready to pop any second now with their first. Leo and Calypso are who-knows-where doing who-knows-what. With a dragon. Hazel and Frank . . . he asked her to marry him the second she turned eighteen. She refused.”

That got more of an expression from Nico than anything else. “She refused?”

Will nodded. “She didn’t want to get married without you there, and she was so sure you’d come back.” Nico’s face went blank again, and Will went on. “Frank kept asking. Finally, last year, she said yes. But she wouldn’t have a wedding; they did a quick civil ceremony. I was their witness.”

Again, there was no response. Will sighed. “You left a big hole in a lot of lives when you left, Nico. I wish you’d at least tell me why, but I can’t force you to. Just . . . know I’m here if you need me.”

Will left the room, his heart heavy.

***

After Will left, Nico closed his eyes and breathed deeply for a few minutes. Will was right; he did have an insanely high pain tolerance. He treated it not as something to be bothered by, but merely as a sign of what he’d injured recently and needed to be careful of.

But seeing Will again? That hurt in a way nothing else did, including the injuries he was currently nursing.

He opened his eyes and eyed the portable urinal for a moment before deciding there was no way he’d be using it. Very carefully, using his right side to compensate for the injuries on his left, he got out of bed. The maneuver took him almost five full minutes. The ensuite was close, just a couple of steps, and someone had thoughtfully added metal bars to the walls. He used the toilet and then filled the sink with hot water to wash up.

He didn’t look at his reflection as he did so. There was nothing he wished to see there.

Absently, he scratched at his latest tattoo, an albatross inked on the outside of his right wrist, right across the bone. It was new enough that it still itched. A woman’s voice echoed inside his head.

_“An albatross for me, Angel. I trust you understand the symbolism?”_

He did, all too well.

Nico made his way back to bed, annoyed again at his lack of clothing. If he could shadow-travel, he could pick up one of his stashes easily enough, but that had been taken from him. He glowered at the inhibitor. He could still feel the shadows, but he couldn’t do anything with them.

Still, as frustrating as it was, the enforced rest was something he needed. He could see that, objectively. The past few weeks had been maddening, and that was before the absolute, galaxy-class cock-up with the hellhounds.

He needed rest. Not taking time to recuperate had nearly gotten him killed, and not just once.

But . . . why did it have to be here? Among the familiar sounds and scents of the only place he’d ever truly felt at home?

With the only person who’d ever felt like home.

Best to get out as soon as he could, then. He drank as much of the unicorn draught as he could stomach.

Then he lay back, trying not to think, trying not to feel, and fell back into an exhausted sleep.

***

The next few days went by in the same, frustrating manner. Nico allowed Will to examine him and change his dressings, but rarely spoke more than a few words. He didn’t speak to the younger healers at all.

Chiron visited him. Whatever they spoke about was kept between them.

Finally, five days after Nico’s arrival, when Will entered his room, Nico greeted him with a full sentence.

“Get me some real clothes, and let me out of this bed,” he demanded.

Will felt like it was a triumph of sorts. “Let me check your wounds first.” Nico glowered. It was so familiar that Will couldn’t help but smile. “Looking cute won’t make me change my mind,” slipped out of his mouth.

Nico’s features smoothed out to neutral, and he turned on his right side to give Will access to his injuries. Will silently kicked himself and took a look. They were healing well under the regimen of ambrosia and unicorn draught. His system was still too full of darkness, and he was still run down from whatever he’d been doing before, but there was no reason not to let him walk around for a while.

“All right,” Will said when he was finished. “Let me fetch you some clothes, and we’ll go for a walk.”

“I don’t need a keeper,” said Nico.

Will gave him a Look. “And I’m not buying that. You’re still not fully recovered, and I don’t trust you to do what’s best for your body right now.” He left the room briefly and came back with clothing. “Here.”

Nico took the clothes, which were a Camp Half-Blood sweatsuit. Orange. “You have got to be kidding.”

Will shrugged. “It’s what we have available right now that won’t pull at your stitches. Once your leg’s completely healed up, I’ll fetch you a pair of jeans from the rummage bin.”

Grumbling under his breath in Italian, Nico pulled the clothes on. He was still moving stiffly, especially on his left side. When he stood up, the sweats did look mildly ridiculous on him, and Will forced himself not to smile.

One pair of borrowed sneakers later, Will and Nico were making their way slowly toward Half-Blood Hill. They didn’t speak. Nico seemed to want to avoid the more populated areas of camp, and Will let him lead.

Finally, after about twenty minutes, Nico spoke. “I’m fine, see? Have Willa take this thing off me.” He displayed his marked palm.

Will smirked. “Race you to the top of the hill.” Nico glared. “No can do, Nico. Whatever war you tagged out of, you’re nowhere near ready to tag back in.”

“You have no idea what’s going on,” Nico snapped.

“You’re right. I don’t. Care to enlighten me?”

There was a long spell of silence from Nico’s direction.

“That’s what I thought. This way. There’s someone else who wants to talk to you.” Will headed toward the Oracle’s cave. After a moment, Nico followed.

“I don’t actually want to talk to anyone else,” said Nico.

“Yeah, I guessed that. Too bad.”

Nico made an exasperated noise, but continued to follow Will.

Rachel was quietly painting in her cave when they arrived. She stood to greet them, wiping her hands.

“Nico! It’s good to see you again. I’d offer you a hug, but one, I’m covered in paint, and two, you were never the hugging type.”

Nico shot another glare in Will’s direction. “Thank you, Rachel, from the bottom of my heart.”

“Hey, I didn’t hug you, either,” Will pointed out.

“I’m still annoyed with you.”

Rachel laughed. “This sounds familiar.”

It felt familiar, too. Whatever Nico had been through, wherever he’d been, Will still felt he knew him like he knew nobody else.

“Why did you want to see me?” Nico asked Rachel.

“I felt like I needed to,” she said. “I . . .”

Her eyes rolled back in her head, and green light and smoke filled the cave. The voice of the Oracle spoke:

_“Apollo’s Legacy, born into strife_  
_Death’s Angel must protect her life_  
_A mother’s life to child bound fast_  
_A father’s choice, peace at last.”_

Will caught Rachel as she sagged and helped her sit back on her stool. When he looked up at Nico, whose face had turned the whitest Will had ever seen, he thought he might have to catch him as well. 

“Are you okay, Nico?” Will asked.

Nico continued to stare at Rachel. “Do – do you know what that means?”

Rachel lifted her head. “No. But I think you might.” She looked at Will. “Have you told him about Dawn?”

Will shook his head. At Camp Half-Blood, “Apollo’s Legacy” could only mean one person. And if “Death’s Angel” was indeed Nico, it was no accident he’d returned.

“What’s she talking about, Will?” Nico asked.

Will stood. “There’s one more place we need to go.”

***

Will’s cottage was small and charming, just a small distance from the Big House. On one side, it had two bedrooms, one for Will and one for Sela and Dawn (as Will sometimes worked very strange hours) separated by a bathroom. The rest of the cabin was an open-floor plan consisting of a kitchen, a dining area and a common room. It was far enough away from the main campground to be quiet at all hours, and Will enjoyed the peace he found there.

Sela was just dressing a freshly-bathed Dawn as Will entered with Nico. The nymph was very pretty, with shining hair the color of a sunset sky. Will knew she was courting with satyr Woodrow, but she was utterly dedicated to Dawn. Even so, she was the one who insisted on being called Dawn’s nanny rather than her mom or even auntie.

She smiled up at Will. “Hi, Will. And . . . your friend?”

“This is Nico di Angelo,” Will said. “The one I told you about. Here, let me finish that; I need to speak to Nico alone.” He took the child from her and finished pulling on her dress.

Sela left, and Nico walked forward, looking almost hypnotized by the child. “Who . . . who is she?”

“Dada!” blurted Dawn.

Nico’s eyes grew wide. Some perverse part of Will was enjoying his shock, but he shut it down quickly.

“Nico, this is my niece, Dawn Kayla Knowles. And yes, I’m raising her as my own.”

He carried the child over to the common room and sat down on the sofa. Dawn started playing with his bead necklace. Nico sat in a nearby chair, and Will took a deep breath, steadying himself to tell the story.

“About a year ago, just after I returned to Camp Half-Blood, Sela walked out of the woods one morning with a two-week-old baby in her arms, asking for me by name. She said – she said that Kayla had been her friend, but then seemed to disappear off the face of the planet for almost two years. Austin and I had lost contact with her at about the same time, by the way. When Kayla found Sela again, she was heavily pregnant and frightened out of her mind. She said the father of her baby was a murderer, he was a monster, and he must never get his hands on their child.

“Cherry was there when she gave birth. Kayla gave Dawn her first name and instructed Sela to find me. Above all, she said, Dawn’s father must not know her whereabouts. Kayla said she’d do her best to deal with him, but Dawn had to be protected, and even Kayla couldn’t know where she was. She said that if she couldn’t raise her daughter, she wanted me to.”

Will gazed sorrowfully at the child he was holding. Her strawberry-blond curls and hazel eyes reminded Will so strongly of his little sister that it hurt.

He looked at Nico, knowing it was time to learn what he didn’t want to know. “Nico, is Kayla . . ?”

Nico shook his head, his shattered-glass eyes distant. “I’m sorry, Will, but she died.”

It felt like he’d been stabbed. Kayla and Nico had become good friends, and Nico invariably knew when someone he had a connection with died. The last, little bit of hope that Will had held quietly flickered out.

Dawn wriggled, indicating she wanted to get down, and Will set her on the rug, where she toddled over to her toys.

“She’s a legacy of Apollo,” Nico noted. “You think she’s the one ‘Death’s Angel’ is supposed to protect.”

“It does seem logical. I know there are plenty of other legacies at Camp Jupiter and New Rome, but she’s the only one here.”

Nico leaned forward, eyes fixed on Dawn. “There’s something else about her, something strange . . . I don’t know why, but she’s triggering my Underworld instincts. I’ll think about it. Maybe look for the answers in a dream, assuming Willa’s little doodle doesn’t stop me.”

Will smiled just a little. “It’s meant to bind your shadow-traveling, and Willa’s pretty good at being specific. She’s a smart girl.”

After a few more moments of watching Dawn, Nico said, “I assume ‘Death’s Angel’ refers to me.”

“Unless you can think of a better candidate.”

“I doubt very much that Azrael is going to show up here. And I’ve been called similar things . . .” Nico trailed off, shivering a little even in the sunny comfort of the cottage and rubbing at a tattoo on his wrist.

Will had to ask. “Nico, what’s with the tattoos? I counted at least forty of them.”

“Forty-three.”

The number brought a spike of pain from Nico. Will had always been particularly sensitive to Nico’s emotions. Whatever that number meant to him, it hurt, and badly.

More than that, though, was the constant undercurrent of fear in Nico. Terror, even. Nico was a warrior. He’d faced down horrors unimaginable to most people. Yet he was so frightened of something here, in one of the safest places on the planet for demigods, that it was practically choking him.

“I’m tired,” Nico announced abruptly, standing up. “I’d prefer to stay in the Hades cabin from now on.”

Will wanted to protest, but knew it would be for his benefit only, not Nico’s. He was more than well enough to leave the infirmary, as long as he didn’t overdo it.

“All right,” he said. “I’ll have your weapons and some real clothes brought down there. Are you okay to get to your cabin?”

“Stop mother-henning me, Solace.”

It was something Nico used to say all the time, whenever he would come back from a quest or even a game of Capture the Flag and Will would look him over for injuries. Even his tone of voice was closer to the affectionate exasperation of his younger days than the hardened tones he’d spoken in recently.

Will let himself smile at the familiarity. “I haven’t changed that much. Will you eat in the mess hall tonight, or would you like your dinner brought to you?”

“I’ll eat in my cabin.” Nico walked to the door and opened it. Before leaving, though, he hesitated, looking at Will as if he wanted to say something. Whatever it was, it remained unsaid, and he left.

***

Somehow, it all started to become normal in the next few days. Nico allowed Will to check him over every day, and the stitches came out. He was eating well and gaining strength. He still didn’t talk to Will much, and talked to anyone else even less, but he seemed somehow less hostile. Every day, he’d drop by the cottage to visit Dawn.

She wasn’t afraid of him, even a little. And it seemed that around her, he softened, too.

Will had asked the cabin counselors to tell their campers not to mention Nico to anyone outside Camp Half-Blood. If word got out to Camp Jupiter or the demigod world at large, there was no power in the world that would stop the old _Argo II_ crew, not to mention Reyna, from coming to see him, and Will completely believed Nico’s threat to bolt.

Which wasn’t to say he wasn’t a hot topic of gossip around camp. Word had gotten around that not only was the Legendary-Nay-Mythic Nico di Angelo at camp, but he and Will used to be a Thing. More than once, when Will entered the infirmary or the Apollo cabin, things went silent. Or, alternatively, Marko and Maya would switch to Chamorro, the native language of Guam which the twins used as their own, private language.

It reminded Will of how he had studied Italian so that he and Nico would have a private language. It was more than a little painful for him, having Nico around. He was surprised at just how much he still felt for his ex-boyfriend.

Perhaps he shouldn’t have been surprised. In New Rome, when Will had finally decided to start dating again, he’d met Gavin, a handsome, intelligent legacy of Vulcan. They’d hit it off immediately, and Will had hoped this would mean he could let Nico go.

And it had been good, for a while. Gavin was a wonderful man and a great boyfriend. They had fun together. Gavin became Will’s first lover. For a time, Will was sure he was in love.

But he could never say the words. Gavin said them. He told Will he understood Will’s reluctance, given the pain of Nico’s disappearance. He was patient, he could wait . . .

Until he couldn’t.

***

_“I’m in love with you, Will. I’m falling deeper every day. Can you say the same?”_

_“I . . . Gav, you know how much I care about you.”_

_“Do you miss me when we’re apart? Do you count the hours until we’re together? Does the thought of not being together in the future hurt?” Gavin’s dark eyes were sad. “Did you feel all those things with Nico?”_

_Will hung his head. He knew Gavin hadn’t said it to hurt him. The truth was, Will and Nico had fit together in a way he and Gavin didn’t. He and Gavin enjoyed many of the same things, they were friends and lovers, and Will did love him, in a way. But even looking back with the perspective of an adult, he could see that his relationship with Nico had been deeper, more intense, more truthful._

_“I’m sorry, Gav,” Will finally managed._

_Gavin hugged him. “No hard feelings. I’m glad we had our time together, but I have to take care of my own heart now.”_

_Will hugged him back. “Someone will love you the way you deserve to be loved. I wish I could’ve been that one.”_

***

One afternoon, Will found Nico in the arena, going through sword drills on his own. Will had always enjoyed watching Nico’s swordplay; he was quick and graceful as a dancer. In the intervening six years, he’d only improved. In spite of the fact that he had to have some residual soreness from his injuries, his form was still beautiful.

And somewhere along the way, Brighid had wandered into the arena.

“I’ve heard you’re something special with a sword,” she announced, sounding like she seriously doubted that what she’d heard was true.

Nico turned and faced her, saying nothing. Will watched, torn between fascination and fear, as Brighid drew her own Celestial bronze, Viking-style short sword. She attacked.

About two seconds later, Nico had disarmed her with contemptuous ease. He stood back, allowing her to pick up her sword again. She fetched it and faced off with Nico again, this time with more caution. She was slightly more successful this time. A good ten seconds passed before Nico again disarmed her.

And so it went. Will grew uneasy. Nico was purposely toying with the daughter of Ares, egging her on as she became visibly agitated. Sometimes, he accompanied disarming her with a smack from the flat of his blade.

After one too many smacks, Brighid snapped. Her attack this time was obviously intended to inflict damage.

In one smooth movement, Nico sidestepped her attack and disarmed her. Then he pivoted, grabbing her around her shoulders from behind, pulling her off balance and bringing his sword to her neck.

For one horrible moment, Will was sure Nico was going to kill her.

“Anger is not your friend,” Nico told her. “Neither is hatred. When you go up against your opponent, the only thing that will help you is if he doesn’t matter to you.”

He released Brighid and strode out of the arena. Will followed.

“That was fairly terrifying,” he said when he caught up with his ex. “What the hell, Nico?”

“Leave me alone.”

Will used his longer legs to outpace Nico and get in front of him. “No, seriously, what was that? You used to train campers here, but I never thought you were actually going to kill one. You were never cruel. Not until now.”

Nico slipped around him. “I’m not the boy you used to know. Leave it at that, Solace.”

“Nico-” Without thinking, Will grabbed his wrist.

Nico snatched his arm away. “Don’t. Touch. Me.”

Will again squashed the hurt. “I keep seeing glimpses of the boy I knew and loved. He’s in there. I just don’t know what’s happened to him.” He stopped himself from reaching out to Nico. “What I know is that you’re in pain, and a lot of it. Why won’t you let me help?”

“You can’t.” Nico’s tone was clipped. “Stop trying. Live your own life, and leave me alone.”

He stepped around Will and disappeared into the Hades cabin.

***

Later, in the darkness of the Hades cabin, Nico tried to calm his agitation. The confrontation with Will had been exhausting. Why had he landed here? No one could shake him like Will, and there was too much at stake.

Including, it appeared, the child that Will was raising as his own. There were questions surrounding her that Nico needed answers to.

Nico closed his eyes and forced himself to sleep.

***

He slipped through the twilight world of dreams with practiced ease. Willa’s inhibitor ring didn’t seem to be stopping him, though he could feel the magical weight of it. In a way, it was good; it felt like a kind of anchor.

He’d tried this every night since he’d met Dawn, but without success. This time, though, he got lucky. He fell into a prophetic dream that took him exactly where he needed to be.

There was a bare hotel room with one occupant. It was Kayla. She stood in the center of the room, unmoving. Her face was white as a corpse’s.

She was a corpse, he realized. A revenant. Who had bound her to this half-existence?

The door opened, and a man stepped in. He was blond and handsome, and something about him was incredibly familiar. Not his face, but his presence. There was something of the Underworld about him.

The man walked up to Kayla and touched her face. “What’s happened to our child, my love?” he asked. “I look, and I look, and I can’t find her.”

Kayla was completely unresponsive. She would, Nico knew, respond to commands, but the man – presumably her master – hadn’t given her any. 

Will’s story now made sense. Kayla had purposely arranged it so that she couldn’t know where Dawn was, not really. She must have known this fate was a possibility, and she’d planned accordingly. Any questions the man posed to her wouldn’t tell him anything important. A revenant couldn’t think, couldn’t imagine, couldn’t speculate.

There was a knock on the door. The man checked through the peephole first, and then he let in a familiar face. And Nico’s heart sank at the sight of the woman, because he now knew beyond a doubt why he’d ended up at Camp Half-Blood.

The woman, whose name was Ruth, looked at Kayla and shuddered. “You need to give up this obsession of yours, Paul.”

“That won’t be happening. Is there any news of the Angel?”

“None. He’s disappeared. Good riddance, I say.”

Paul’s mouth tightened. “He’s disappeared off our radar before, and it’s never ended well. For any of us.”

Ruth pulled out an e-cig, took a drag on it, and breathed out a cloud of vapor. “With any luck, the hellhounds chewed him up. Even if they didn’t kill him, maybe they took him out of action for a while.”

“That would be good. Still, we can’t take any chances. What have you brought me?”

Ruth smiled and laid a laptop case on the table. “Exactly what you asked for.” She took a cloth-wrapped, flat bundle out.

Paul unwrapped it, revealing a stack of animal-skin parchments. He sighed in satisfaction. “The Codex Borgia. My dear Ruth, you’ve outdone yourself, even as a daughter of Mercury.”

“And it’ll cost you. I want to buy myself a safe haven that can hold off Interpol, the Legion, and the Angel.”

“Oh, you’ll be paid well. Kayla? Pay her.”

The revenant moved faster than a mere human could. A Celestial bronze dagger was through Ruth’s heart before the thief knew what was happening. As she sagged to the floor, Paul approached her, smiling apologetically.

“I’m sorry, Ruth, but I needed another death. Don’t worry; your corpse won’t go to waste. Not when I’m so close to my goals . . .”

Nico pulled himself from his dream and woke up, covered in cold sweat.

He had his answers, and he didn’t want them.

***

The next day, Nico didn’t make his usual appearance at the mess hall, where he usually showed up just long enough to get food to take back to the Hades cabin. Nor did he visit Will’s cottage. He didn’t do his usual exercise, either.

Around midday, Will finally grew concerned enough to push aside the sting of the previous day’s argument and went to the Hades cabin.

“Nico?” he called, knocking on the door. “Nico, I just need to know if you’re all right.”

There was no answer, so Will opened the door and walked in. As his eyes adjusted to the dim light, he realized Nico was sitting on the floor next to Hades’s altar, unmoving.

“Nico?” Will moved closer to him and squatted down. “Are you all right?”

Nico’s eyes finally found Will’s face, and fear hit Will like a storm wave.

“I had a dream last night,” Nico whispered. “I know why I’m here. I know why I have to protect Dawn.”

“That’s good, isn’t it?” Will asked. 

Nico shook his head. “No.”

“Why not?”

“Because I have to tell you.” Nico looked away. “I have to tell you about the last six years. And I don’t want to.”

Will made to reach for him again, but stopped himself in time. “Nico, whatever’s happened, whatever you’ve done, I promise, you can tell me. I won’t judge you.”

Nico rubbed a hand over his face, and a weary, cynical chuckle escaped him. “Why do you have to be so nice?”

That made Will smile, because it was another thing Nico used to say to him when he thought Will was being too sympathetic. “It’s just how I am.”

Nico pushed himself to his feet, fetched a glass of water and drank from it. “I’ll tell you. But first, I have a request.”

Will stood as well. “Anything.”

For a long moment, Nico said nothing. And then he looked at Will, his face so open, so vulnerable, that it took Will’s breath away.

“Kiss me.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you don't understand the symbolism of an albatross, it's in the poem "Rime of the Ancient Mariner" by Coleridge.


	3. The War of Shadows

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nico tells Will where he's been for the last six years; Will seeks wisdom; Nico has a visitor.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The things you learn doing research for fanfic. Did you know the plural of "necropolis" is "necropoleis"? I sure didn't until now!
> 
> Thanks to everyone who's commented thus far. I love kudos, don't get me wrong, but I love knowing what people are thinking about the story even more.

Will didn’t understand a thing about what was going on. He was confused and more than a little frightened.

But Nico di Angelo had just asked Will to kiss him, and it was a request Will couldn’t deny. He moved forward, taking Nico’s face in his hands, and kissed him.

For a moment, Nico stiffened, as if he hadn’t expected his request to be fulfilled. And then his arms were wrapping around Will, and he was kissing back with a depth of passion that sent lightning bolts through his brain.

Will pulled Nico closer, deepening the kiss, and oh, he remembered this, remembered the feel of Nico’s lean body in his arms, remembered the taste of his kisses . . .

One kiss turned into another and another, and Will’s heart felt like it would burst out of his chest. He could feel his emotions blending with Nico’s. So much pain, so much need, so much passion, that he had to repress them lest they overwhelm him.

Will had to break the kiss to breathe properly. He realized they were both trembling as he rested his forehead against Nico’s.

“You can’t tell me there isn’t still something between us, not after that,” Will said, his voice husky in his own ears. He pressed one hand against Nico’s chest, right where the sun tattoo was. “And this tattoo – why?”

“It’s a reminder that . . . that someone as kind and as good as you loved me.” Nico’s breath hitched. “At first, it was a symbol of hope, that maybe, one day, I could come back to you. And then it became a reminder of what I can never have, ever again.”

Will cupped Nico’s cheek in one hand, and Nico leaned into the touch. “Why do you think we can’t be together again?”

Slowly, reluctantly, Nico pulled away. There was a slight flush in his cheeks, and his odd, colorless eyes were shadowed. “Because of what I’ve done. What I’ve become.”

Will sat down in a chair, as his legs were feeling wobbly. “Please, just tell me, Nico. Where have you been?”

“Here. There. Everywhere.” Nico sat on the edge of his bed. “I’ve done a grand tour of the world’s necropoleis. Every entrance to the Underworld, every dark place in this world. I’ve spoken with Lord Yama at Varanasi, met the Shinigami in Aokigahara, taken counsel with the Ghost Kings at Fengdu, teamed up with Anubis to reclaim the Egyptian Book of the Dead at Thebes, gone to the Gates of Guinee for an extremely unsettling confrontation with Baron Samedi . . .” He sighed. “There is a war going on, Will, a war of shadows, and I’m the only one my father trusts to fight it.”

“Who’s on the other side?”

“Death cultists. There have been death cults since before the Greek Empire arose. Mostly, they were harmless – well, not exactly harmless, but at the very least, limited in the damage they could do.” Nico was twisting his skull ring again. “Hades keeps an eye on them in case they start to get too powerful. Which is exactly what one group has done. They’ve collected items of power from the most ancient gods. Gods who have very little power in this world now, but who once held parts of the Underworld. Each item they collect gives them a little more power, and it’s been growing since World War II. Finally, Hades grew concerned enough about them that he decided something had to be done.”

“He called you in,” Will deduced.

Nico nodded. “The cultists are spread around the globe, but are concentrated in the Western world, specifically the United States and Europe. They both worship death and want to vanquish it. And the great prize, as far as they’re concerned, is Hades. Both my father and his realm.”

Will understood that. Most people in the Western world, when asked who the god of the dead was, would answer, “Hades.” That kind of recognition had its own power.

“Father hoped that a visit from his son would make an impression on them, so he sent me to a group of cultists in upstate New York. I went, and I warned them that Hades knew what they were trying to do, and that what they were doing was dangerous to the whole world.”

Nico paused for a long moment. “If they succeed in their aims, it will be catastrophic. Do you understand that? Do you remember when Thanatos was captured? What they're doing will have even graver consequences.” His voice held a plea. “Hades told me that I had to stop them. I had to do whatever it took, use whatever means were necessary. So I warned them about the consequences of their actions, pleaded with them, tried to make them see reason.”

He stood and began to pace, agitated. “But the leader of that group, he wouldn’t budge. Father gifted me with more shadow magic, the ability to watch and listen through the shadows, and I could see . . . he was only becoming more fanatical. More dangerous. And when he made plans to capture an ancient Native American death god . . .” Nico almost choked. “I had to stop him.”

And Will understood. “You . . . you killed him.”

Nico nodded slowly. “He was a former Legionnaire, a legacy of Mars. So many of them were either demigods or legacies. I-I got the Celestial bronze dagger because my sword would trap his soul. I didn’t want that.” He stared into the distance. “I still remember how warm his blood was.”

Will felt ill. “Is that – is that when you left the note?”

“Yes.” For a long moment, Nico was silent. “I hoped that would be the end of it. I prayed it would. But it wasn’t. His immediate followers took up his cause. I would warn them, give them time to reconsider. Every time, I’d speak to them personally first, then watch for a time to see what they did. They started to call me the Angel of Death. They were frightened of me. Some did leave the cult. But others . . .”

“How many?” Will asked. He thought he knew the answer.

Nico looked down at the tattoos on his arms. “Forty-three. The tattoos, I started getting them to remember. I can name each one of them, tell you something about them.” He touched the clock face on his right arm. “He had a treasured collection of antique fob watches. He got into the cult after a near-death experience.” Nico turned his arm over, exposing a rose. “She was a legacy of Venus who lost her husband.”

Will held up a hand without meaning to. He couldn’t hear more of this. It would have, in a way, been better if Nico had been boasting. As it was, he spoke in the quiet, bleak tones of a man who knew he was damned.

“There’s more,” Nico said. “I’m sorry, Will, but you have to hear it. Kayla, she got involved with a leader in the movement. I didn’t realize it until I saw him in a dream. A daughter of Mercury who’s been stealing artifacts for the movement gave him the Codex Borgia, a centuries-old book with information on the Aztec Underworld. He killed her.” Nico took a deep breath. “And he killed Kayla. He’s Dawn’s father, Will. Kayla must have gone to confront him after giving birth. He killed her . . . and he turned her into a revenant under his command.”

Tears were running down Will’s face. It felt like he couldn’t breathe. Without knowing how he got there, he found himself on his feet. “I-I have to . . . I need air.”

Nico nodded. “It’s okay. Go.”

Will rushed from the cabin.

***

Will’s feet started taking him toward the infirmary, but he realized quickly he was in no shape to work. It was Dawn’s nap time, so she and Sela would be at the cottage, and he didn’t want to be around anyone. Instead, he headed for the canoe lake, to the wooded areas beside it.

For a time, he just wandered, needing to move while his brain churned over the information he’d been given. He couldn’t even begin to process it yet.

He stepped into a quiet clearing, not easy to see from the water, and he recognized it. He and Nico had met there to talk sometimes, when they needed privacy. It was where they’d had their first kiss.

Will collapsed to the ground and began to sob. How was he supposed to deal with this? With Nico having turned into an assassin for his father, with Kayla trapped between life and death?

He needed clarity. He needed to talk to someone, anyone else. But he didn’t know who he could talk to.

“Will I do?”

The warm, musical voice had Will on his feet in a moment. Apollo stood there, looking like Will’s hot older brother, a bow on his back and a ukulele on his hip. His eyes were gentle and sympathetic.

“Dad,” Will gasped. Before he knew what he was doing, he was in his father’s arms, weeping on his shoulder. Warmth spread through his body, and the pain in his heart eased a little. Apollo had become a good father since his stint as a human, and he’d been especially close to Will, Austin . . . and Kayla.

As soon as he regained some control, Will drew back. “Did you know?”

Apollo sighed. “There have been rumors, things Hermes has seen and Persephone has told her mother. But all of these doings have been in the shadows and beyond my view.”

Will nodded, trying to push down the anger he was feeling. He knew it was unfair to aim it at Apollo, but at the moment, he wasn’t fond of any of the gods. “What about – what about Kayla?”

“Sadly, Will, I can do nothing for her.” Apollo’s voice was gentle. “This is a matter for Hades. Or Nico. He could set her at rest.”

“How?”

“I couldn’t say. Each revenant is bound here by something from their old life. You would have to discover what that is for her.”

The words of the prophecy came rushing back to Will. “Dawn. Somehow, it’s Dawn. It has to be. Maybe Nico . . .” The sick, overwhelming feeling of what Nico had told him hit Will again. “Oh, gods, Dad, what do I do? I gave up on him! He was out there fighting a war while I was going to college and sleeping with a guy named Gavin!”

Apollo set a hand on his shoulder. “Son. Don’t beat yourself up. Even we Olympians cannot know all that goes on in the Underworld. None but Hades does. Nico was gone. You had reason to believe it was a lover’s betrayal.”

That didn’t help. “One, I never thought he betrayed me. Two, we weren’t actually lovers.”

“Really?” Apollo looked taken aback. “I’d assumed you were. I certainly would have ‘tapped that ass,’ as you kids say.” Will hid his face in his hands and made a noise of pure misery. “How old were you when you lost your virginity, anyway?”

“Do we really have to discuss this?”

“You don’t think Nico’s still a virgin, do you?”

“Dad! This is not helping!”

Apollo seemed to notice Will’s embarrassment. “Oh. Sorry, son. As I was saying, you didn’t know, and there was no way you could. Don’t blame yourself; it’s a waste of energy. You may still be able to do something for him.”

Will didn’t feel any better. “I just . . . tell me what to do. I don’t know how to deal with this.”

“Much as it pains me to say, my son, I don’t know, either. This is a mortal matter. Has Nico sworn you to secrecy regarding this?”

Will thought back over their conversation. “No.”

“Then perhaps you had better consult his friends.”

“He doesn’t want them here,” Will protested.

“Then perhaps you’d best talk to the wisest of them first.”

Annabeth. Even thinking about her was a kind of relief. He needed a cool head, and hers was Antarctica.

“That’s – that’s a good idea. I’ll Iris message her.” Will felt like he could breathe again. “Thanks, Dad. And . . . thanks for being here for me.”

Apollo embraced him again. “Have courage, my son. Trust yourself.”

Will drew back almost reluctantly. “I’m going to call Percy and Annabeth now.”

“And I,” said Apollo, “think I shall visit my granddaughter and give her my blessing.” He headed off toward the cottage, and Will made for the Big House.

Once there, he made his way to a private room with a fountain that was meant for just this purpose. He flipped a drachma through it and requested Annabeth. Her image shimmered into view. She appeared to be studying, which made sense, as she was going for a master’s degree.

“Will!” she said, startled. “What’s going on?”

“Nico’s back.”

Annabeth’s eyes grew wide. “My gods. Is he okay?” She peered at him. “Are you okay?”

Will felt his throat tightening again. “No. And . . . no. I-I need advice.”

She set aside her study materials. “Tell me everything.”

He did, starting from Nico being brought into his infirmary. Annabeth knew about Dawn – Robbie was the same age, and he and Dawn played together whenever the Chase-Jacksons visited Camp Half-Blood – but Nico’s information about Kayla was new to her. She listened as the words poured out of Will, occasionally asking questions for clarification or offering comfort when he broke down again.

When the story came to an end, Annabeth was quiet for a good five minutes. Will didn’t dare interrupt her thoughts.

“All right,” she finally said. “I’m with you; I believe he’ll bolt if we all show up. But if just one . . .” She trailed off, thinking hard. “Listen, Will, I’ll handle this end of things. Someone will be there within the next day or so.”

“What should I do?” Will practically begged.

Annabeth’s gray eyes softened. “Follow your healer’s instincts. Right now, Nico probably believes you left because you’re so repulsed by him. But what I’m hearing from you is that you’re most upset that he’s been going through all of this alone. Let him know that. Let him know you’re here for him. And above all, keep an eye on him.”

It felt right. Will’s burning brain was finally cooling off. “Okay. Okay. Thanks, Annabeth.”

She smiled gently. “Take care, Will.”

Will cut the link, feeling much better. 

***

In the gloom of the Hades cabin, Nico sat, unmoving. Every bit of hope had been drained out of him. In a way, it would’ve been easier if Will had been angry. Instead, he was just disgusted. It looked like he’d been about to vomit when he left the cabin.

It hurt too much to move. Knowing what he’d become, it was harder to go on every single day.

The door opened. It was Will. Why was he back?

“Nico?” Will’s voice was gentle. He came in, knelt next to Nico. “Nico, are you okay?”

Nico looked up at Will. “Why are you here?”

“Because I need to apologize.”

That made no sense. Nico just stared.

Will sighed, shifting to sit on the floor. “I’m sorry I walked out earlier. It was just . . . it was hard, hearing those things. About Kayla. About you. It hurts to know what you’ve been forced to become.”

“How can you even look at me?” Nico’s voice was near a whisper.

“I know you didn’t choose this. I know it’s hurting you. And I want to help.”

He was too kind. Will was always too kind.

Nico leaned against the wall. “I’m tired, Will. I’m so tired. I don’t . . . I don’t even know why I’m doing this anymore. If this world is even worth saving.” He turned his wrist, showed Will the albatross. “Her son was a demigod. Do you remember Matt Harlow?”

Will nodded. “A son of Ares. He died in the Battle of Manhattan.”

“He was his mother’s only child. She joined the cultists to spite the gods. Said that they only used their children to further their agendas, and if the cult succeeded in overturning Western civilization, it would be worth it to be rid of the gods. When I came to kill her, she wasn’t afraid. Told me she knew about the tattoos. Told me she wanted an albatross, like in the Rime of the Ancient Mariner.” Nico could still see her defiant face. “I didn’t want to kill her. I still did.”

“Nico, I . . .” Will stopped for a moment. “I don’t know what to do with all of this, not even remotely. I don’t know how to answer your questions, or even if they have answers. But I do know I have a little girl now, and protecting her, leaving her a better world, is more important to me than anything. According to the prophecy, you’re supposed to protect her, too. And in spite of everything, up to and including the fact that you’ve been drafted as your dad’s wetworks man, I believe you’ll do it. I believe you’ll protect her to your last breath. So let’s start there.”

“O-okay.” 

“My dad visited me. He said you could put Kayla to rest. He said every revenant is bound by something from their lives, and I think that’s Dawn, for Kayla.”

Nico nodded. “Yes, it does make sense. She arranged things so she didn’t know where Dawn would be, because she knew that he could force her to tell him everything she knew. Not knowing . . . that could be the lever. I’d have to get close enough to talk to her, though, and you know how deadly she is with a bow.”

“Would she recognize us?”

“Not necessarily.” Shifting the conversation to his area of expertise made Nico feel a little more in control. “Revenants are fixed on one idea. They know very little else. She might have some reaction to you, since you’re her brother. But I don’t know where she is. Her master’s been able to divert attention from himself for this long; he obviously knows how to hide, even from me.”

“We’ll tackle that as it comes.” Will stood up and offered his hand. “Come on. It’s dinnertime, and you haven’t eaten at all today.”

“Not hungry.”

“I don’t care. You need to take care of yourself, Nico, even if you don’t feel like it.”

Will wasn’t going to budge. Nico knew that from considerable experience. So, reluctantly, he took Will’s hand and stood, and the two of them went to the mess hall.

***

Dinner wasn’t quite as intimidating as Nico was afraid it might be (except for Brighid marching up to him and demanding a rematch, which Nico promised her). He hated being in public when he was feeling vulnerable, and talking to Will always left him feeling that way.

But he made himself accompany Will to the cottage to see little Dawn again. He wondered what her father’s ancestry was, because he still felt there was something of the Underworld about her. Babies tended to react to him the way animals did, but she had never been afraid of him. She’d toddle over to him and babble at him or hand him a toy, and even asked to be picked up by him.

As for Will himself . . . there was a tension there. Nico couldn’t believe Will really trusted him, not after learning of Nico’s activities for the past six years. Yet Will was still giving him access to Dawn. And then there’d been that kiss . . . 

He hungered for more contact with Will, needed it. But Will was being careful, the way he’d been after the Gaea war, when Nico had been so touch-averse. Will had been so respectful of Nico’s limits then, making sure Nico was okay with any level of touch. Nico knew Will was doing the same thing now, but part of him whispered that Will’s distance was because he was repulsed by Nico.

It had been so much easier when he’d stayed away. Being here hurt, reminding him of friendships, of belonging, of being blissfully in love.

The next day, Nico distracted himself by sparring with Brighid, this time with less bruising and more teaching. He ended up spending several hours training Ares kids in swordplay.

As night settled in, though, his heart sank again. What was he doing here? He could never again be a true part of this world. And being around Will was just serving to remind him of how much Nico wanted him. And couldn’t have him.

Nico wandered restlessly down to the canoe lake. He remembered boating with Will, spending afternoons talking there because it was the only place where other people couldn’t stumble across them (with the exception of Percy that one time).

He ended up making a circuit of the lake, trying to relieve some of the tension inside. As he returned to the campground, a woman’s voice began singing, the music floating over the lake. Her voice was warm, jazzy, sensual. And familiar.

She was sitting on one of the benches by the lake, dressed in white, hugely pregnant, and as beautiful as a goddess. As Nico approached, she turned her head, her multicolored eyes shining in the moonlight.

“Hello, Nico,” said Piper Grace. “It’s great to see you again.”


	4. Breaking Apart

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An unexpected event brings Nico's friends and sister to Camp Half-Blood.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was a really tough chapter to sequence. I feel a bit bad for skimping on Percy, but I didn't want the chapter to get too repetitive.
> 
> Speaking of neglected people, I went back and added a note about Leo to ch. 2. To wit: He and Calypso are who-knows-where doing who-knows-what. With a dragon.

Nico stared at Piper. “What are you doing here?”

Instead of answering, she held out a hand. “Help me up, would you? Being this pregnant plays havoc with your center of gravity.”

Caught off-guard, Nico automatically helped her stand. Piper was his height, but pregnancy seemed to have pulled her downward a little. He couldn’t help but think of the contrast between the two of them. Piper’s olive skin, rich brown hair and kaleidoscope eyes couldn’t have been more different than Nico’s lack of color. More than that, though, was the fact that she was bearing life within her.

Nico brought only death.

“Why are you here?” he asked again.

Piper hadn’t let go of his hand. Her hand in his reminded him of sunny afternoons talking with Will, canoeing on the lake together, watching fireworks leaning against Will’s shoulder . . .

He pulled his hand away. Piper was a daughter of Aphrodite. She carried with her an aura of romantic love, and he didn’t want the memories it was bringing back.

“You were wrong to expect Will to be able to handle all of this on his own,” said Piper.

She was right, and Nico knew it. He hated the idea of all his friends being here. They were good people; they would have to judge him for his actions over the past six years. But that left Will with almost nobody who would be able to help him. Will, who had his first love return after so long apart. Will, who had just learned of his beloved sister’s hideous fate.

“So, is everyone here?” Nico asked.

Piper shook her head. “No. Just me. Will was smart enough to only speak to Annabeth. She decided that what you needed was a lover, not a warrior.”

“What?”

“Remember when you used to ask me for love advice?” Piper asked.

Nico felt his cheeks heat a little. During the early days of his relationship with Will, not having ever had a boyfriend before, Nico had turned to Piper with his questions. She’d always been patient and insightful and had never made him feel silly or stupid. They’d become good friends. And, as much as Nico hated to admit it, it was good to see her.

Her words about being a lover rather than a warrior were starting to make sense, now that he thought about them. Piper could fight, and very well, but she wasn’t a warrior by nature. Jason or Percy would probably have shown up and put him in a hammerlock, as would Reyna. Annabeth would have lectured him. And Hazel . . .

He didn’t want to think about Hazel.

“Then you’re the one they called in for an intervention, is that it? A murder intervention.”

“Don’t think of it as an intervention. Think of it as another chat with your old love guru.” Piper took his arm and ushered him up the beach in no uncertain terms. “How are things with Will?”

“With Will?” Nico looked at her incredulously. “Piper, let’s go over this again: I’ve been cutting the throats of mortals and demigods for the past six years on the orders of my father. Literally cutting their throats.” He pulled his arm away from her. “Do you really think Will can forgive that? Can any of you forgive that? I’m a monster!”

“Monsters don’t wear their penance carved into their skin, Nico.” Piper took his hand again and turned it to reveal the albatross. “I have a couple of tattoos myself now. The ones that go over bone hurt the most.” She touched the albatross, and then she ran her fingers over a Pisces on his collarbone. “You’re punishing yourself over and over again. If any of us thought you really were the remorseless killer you apparently think you are, we’d be fighting you. Right now, though, we want to fight for you. Will is fighting for you in the only way he can.”

“Will doesn’t even know me anymore!” Nico burst out. “And I don’t know him. There can’t be any future for us. I’m sorry for the pain I’ve caused him, but everything we had is over.”

Piper gave him a gentle, knowing look. “Do you love him?”

“I – I . . .” The answer Nico tried to give stuck in his throat. “I loved him so much that it nearly killed me to leave him. And then, as the years went on, I told myself that what I loved was the idea of Will. The innocence I regained with him.”

“And now that you’re here? Now that you’ve seen him again?”

Nico thought of the Will he’d seen over the past two weeks. Kind, compassionate Will, still a healer. Will the mentor for his younger siblings, Will the father for his adopted child.

He was still Nico’s Will, only better, weathered by time and sorrow into manhood. And there was only one answer to Piper’s question.

“I still love him. But I don’t see how he could ever love me again. I’m damned, Piper.”

“Oh, Nico,” Piper breathed, holding his hand between hers. “Why do you think Will called Annabeth? Why do you think this has hurt him so much? He still sees you, the real you. Not the assassin, but the boy, the person, he fell in love with. You two had something real as teens. Everyone could see it. We demigods have to give up a lot for our gifts. We tend to live short, turbulent lives. Maybe one compensation is being able to know when you’ve met your soulmate, the way I knew with Jason and Annabeth knew with Percy. You and Will had that. You were each other’s other half. It may be more work to put yourselves back together now, but it’s still possible. You still have so much love to give.” She touched his face. “Let us help you.”

He pulled away from her. “No. I may hate what I have to do, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to put it off on someone else.”

“What if there’s another way?” Piper looked at him expectantly. “Your father gave you orders to stop the cultists. What if we could find a better way to fight? What if we could help you end this war? Will you let us try?”

Nico looked down at his arms. “And what does it mean for me if all these deaths were unnecessary?”

“It means you fought the war in the only way you knew how. You can’t change the past, my old friend. Your most difficult task will be learning how to forgive yourself. How to accept friendship and love again.”

“Piper . . .” Nico’s vision blurred. “It hurts so much.”

She immediately reached out and pulled his head down to her shoulder. The embrace was a little awkward because of her belly, but Nico needed her warmth. He wanted so badly to be loved, and he’d pushed that desire away for years because he thought it was impossible. She made him think he could believe again.

He heard her gasp just a little and pulled back. “Are you okay?”

She pressed a hand against her belly. “Yeah, just a contraction. Don’t worry, they happen all the time.”

***

Cora Rose Grace was born at the Camp Half-Blood infirmary shortly after 3 AM. Fortunately, Jason was in New York and managed to get there in time for the birth. The baby was two weeks early, but perfectly healthy.

Nico stood outside the room, peeking in, wanting to make sure Piper was all right while not being seen by her, Jason or Will.

“I’ve got to say, this went a lot more smoothly than the first time I delivered a baby,” Will was saying. “I tried to pass off the duty of delivering little Chuck on one of my sisters, you know, but Clarisse stuck ten inches of Celestial bronze under my chin and informed me that as the camp’s best healer, I would be attending the birth. I found her argument persuasive, and my shorts damp.”

Piper laughed an exhausted little laugh. Jason was too enraptured by his daughter’s face to notice anything else. The whole scene was messy and emotional and so full of life it hurt.

“Nico?” It was Piper’s voice. “Why don’t you come in and meet Cora?”

Jason finally looked up and spotted him. Tears of joy were shining on his face, which somehow managed to light up even more at the sight of Nico. “Nico! It’s so good to see you again, man. Get in here and meet my little girl. She’s just so . . .” He looked down at the baby in his arms again. “She’s so amazing.”

Nico shook his head, backing away. “Uh, babies usually find me upsetting. I’ll just . . . I’ll go.” He left quickly, oddly afraid of how the scene in the room made him feel.

He hadn’t quite left the infirmary when Jason caught up to him. “Nico!”

Nico stopped and turned, bracing himself for a confrontation. Instead, he got a hug. Jason, so much bigger than Nico, practically enveloped him.

“I’m so glad you’re back,” Jason murmured in his ear. “Seriously glad to see you.”

Nico pulled away from the hug, feeling like he was missing something, somehow. “Jason, has anyone told you about . . ?”

“What you’ve been doing? Yeah, Annabeth explained it.” Jason tucked his thumbs into his pockets and shook his head. “That’s . . . it’s got to be rough, man.”

Jason’s sympathy angered Nico. “It has been. Especially on the people I’ve killed and their loved ones.”

Jason tilted his head and gave Nico a quiet, considering look. “Do you expect me to condemn you, Nico?”

“Why wouldn’t you?”

“Because I’m Roman.” Jason’s blue gaze was direct and honest. “I was a praetor. I presided over punishments, including two executions. Sure, I didn’t hold the sword, but it was still my responsibility, and one I took seriously. I never looked away, not for a second. The thing that had been jammed into my head from the time I was a toddler was that the good of Rome takes precedence. We do what we have to do in order to protect the Legion, Rome, and the world.” He dared to set a hand on Nico’s shoulder. “We all saw what happened when Thanatos was chained. What your father tasked you with was protecting the world from a terrible threat. Yeah, you’ve had to take terrible steps to get that done. The gods place heavy burdens on us, and yours may be the heaviest of all. There’s not one of us who won’t understand that. And there’s not one of us who won’t try to help you in any way that we can.”

What hurt the worst was that Nico knew Jason was telling the truth. None of the _Argo II_ crew, none of the people he’d befriended and served with, would condemn him for his actions. And Nico suddenly understood that he hadn’t stayed away to avoid their condemnation; he’d stayed away because he feared their forgiveness.

“I have to go,” he said thickly, pulling away. This time, Jason didn’t follow him.

***

The sky was just beginning to lighten in the east when Will finally left the infirmary. He was absolutely exhausted, but happy for Jason and Piper. He was especially grateful for what Piper had told him about her conversation with Nico. Will had always liked Piper. The way she let herself be guided by her intuition was something Will envied; he inevitably fell prey to second thoughts and general overthinking.

When he reached his cottage, there was a surprise. Nico sat on the front step, almost blending into the shadows. He looked weary, burdened.

Will sat down by him. “Are you all right, or is that a stupid question?”

Nico didn’t answer for a long moment. Then he said, “I don’t even know why I’m here. I just . . . I wanted to see you.”

“Well, I’m here.” Will looked at Nico’s profile, pale in the pre-dawn shadows. “Have you been alone all this time? Six years?”

Nico shrugged a little. “Mostly. I told you I teamed up with Anubis once. Well, Anubis and his girlfriend. They’re an interesting pair. In Japan, I got followed around by a bored Shinigami who thought I looked entertaining. And I worked with two different Valkyries, one in Boston and another in Chicago, on things that involved the Norse Underworld, not to mention the Chicago Mob. But mostly?” He shook his head. “I didn’t want to involve anyone else, so I stayed away from everyone I knew – except Anubis, we go back a ways – and didn’t form any new attachments.”

Will swallowed the lump in his throat. Nico had always tried to pretend he didn’t need attachments, but anyone who knew him knew how deep his feelings ran for his friends and sister. For him to have been alone, without anyone he could count on . . .

“I’m sorry to hear that, Nico. I’m sorry you’ve felt you had to do this alone. I can’t imagine how hard it’s been for you.”

Nico looked over at him. “I couldn’t ask anyone else to do this for me, or with me. And sooner or later, the war will suck me back in. I know that. But you shouldn’t be alone, Will. I don’t grudge you finding someone else to love.”

Will had to ask. “Nico, have you . . . have you ever had a lover?”

Dropping his eyes, Nico shook his head. “I couldn’t get attached, and without love . . . I don’t see the point.”

So, not just solitary, but celibate as well. Will’s heart dropped even further. Yes, he’d have been jealous of anyone who’d been Nico’s lover, but hearing that he hadn’t had even that was worse. Much worse. Will knew Nico had been looking forward to intimacy as much as he himself had. He’d felt Nico’s longing then, and he felt it now.

But Nico had denied himself the comfort of a lover’s arms as part of his self-imposed penance for what Hades required of him. He’d denied part of his soul, his humanity, in order to be able to carry out his father’s orders.

Perhaps, then, that was the reason he’d come back to Camp Half-Blood. Nico needed to be reminded of what it was to be human, to be part of humanity. And Will resolved to do just that.

Will stood and offered a hand up to Nico. “Come on.”

Hesitantly, Nico took his hand and followed Will into the cottage. “What are you doing?”

“I’m exhausted, and I know you’ve been up all night, too. I’m going to get some sleep.” Will opened his bedroom door. “Join me?”

“Will . . . what?”

“Just a nap, Nico. Like we used to do.”

Will remembered quiet afternoons when he and Nico would meet and talk beside the lake and then settle into each other for a little sleep in the sunshine. Or when they’d fall asleep watching a movie in the Apollo cabin, and Will’s siblings would always razz him about how cute they looked.

There was a longing look in Nico’s eyes as he gazed around the cottage, but he shook his head. “I can’t. I’m sorry, Will. I should go.”

He left the cottage, and Will sat down on his bed, defeated.

***

Project “Make Nico Feel Human Again” kicked off in full the following day. Percy and Annabeth, along with little Robbie, came to camp to meet the new Grace. Percy, like Jason, greeted Nico with warmth and enthusiasm. It seemed to unsettle Nico, which Will hoped wouldn’t cause him to bolt.

Jason took the opportunity to challenge his cousins to sparring. Word got out quickly, and the arena filled with campers. The Seven, along with Nico, were legends among the youngsters.

To be truthful, Will was a little concerned about the sparring, given how violent Nico had been with Brighid when she’d challenged him. He needn’t have worried, though; Percy and Jason were more likely to laugh than lose their tempers.

What became obvious very quickly was that Nico was better than either of them. Neither Percy nor Jason had sat back and rested on their laurels during the past six years, but they also hadn’t been fighting the way Nico had. He danced between them, making moves that looked suicidal, but ended with his sword at one of their necks. Jason kept calling for halts and making Nico show him moves. Percy kept taking opportunities to swat his friends’ backsides with Riptide, and eventually got Nico’s elbow in his gut.

They were having fun. Nico almost looked tempted to smile. The audience was having fun, too. Piper had come down from the infirmary with her baby, which her siblings were cooing over. They held her in outright awe, the woman who had put Gaea to sleep with her voice.

Jules, however, wasn’t cooing or making bets on the sparring. He was watching Will, and not in a subtle way. At one point, he turned to Piper and spoke quietly with her for a few minutes.

Finally, the sparring came to an end. Percy attempted to put Nico in a headlock and swiftly found himself on his ass.

“Smooth move, Seaweed Brain!” Annabeth called. If there was one thing she loved to do, it was to razz her husband.

Nico froze. Will followed his gaze . . . to Hazel, striding through the crowd of teens leaving the arena. Her expression was unreadable. Nico stood still, waiting for her to reach him.

When she did, she slapped him so hard it sounded like a gunshot. Nico reeled with the blow and then faced her again, making no move to defend himself.

Will hadn’t even noticed Piper approaching until she murmured over his shoulder, “Time for the rest of us to go.” Reluctantly, he followed her, Jason, Annabeth and Percy out of the arena, leaving Hazel and Nico alone.

***

Nico had figured that at least one of the people he’d left behind would hit him and had just hoped it wouldn’t be Reyna, because he was fairly certain she could take off his head with one blow. As it turned out, he reflected, he really should have been more concerned about Hazel. His ears were still ringing from her blow.

And now words were spilling out of her mouth, angry and hurt and desperate and painful. Her Louisiana accent, always thicker when she was upset, made it hard for him to understand some of what she was saying, especially as she kept lapsing into Latin and French Creole, but the gist was clear enough.

“. . . my brother, my only family, and you thought you could just disappear and I’d be okay? You idiot! You stubborn, hard-headed, emotionally-stunted moron! Do you have any idea what you put us through? Me, your friends, poor Will? He and I used to get together and just cry because we were so worried about you, so hurt that you’d leave us . . .”

He let her rant, not offering any defense. She was right, of course. He’d hurt her terribly with his disappearance. He knew how difficult it was to be a child of the Underworld, not to mention someone who’d been taken out of their proper time. He and Hazel shared that bond that no one else, not even the one she loved the most, could understand.

“. . . and then you don’t even tell me when you finally come back and threaten to run off if Will called me. How do you think that makes me feel? Like you couldn’t be bothered with your little sister because of your big, important job, like I wouldn’t understand why you’re doing what you’re doing! And if you say one word about thinking I’d hate you for it, I will beat the shit out of you. You’re my brother, I love you . . . you just left!”

The words ran out as Hazel broke down. She grabbed him and pulled him into a fierce hug, sobbing into his shoulder, and Nico wrapped his arms around her.

“I’m sorry, Hazel, I’m so sorry,” he murmured into her hair. “I-I just thought it would be easier this way.”

She smacked the back of his head, still crying. “Easier for who?”

For himself, that was who, and he was realistic enough to admit it. It was easier to be the Angel if he could pretend he wasn’t human. Easier to quiet the voices of the dead, easier to go on methodically to his next target.

And now his friends, and Will, and Hazel, were making him feel human again. Making him feel. Mainly, he felt like someone had peeled all his skin off.

He held Hazel as she cried, murmuring apologies, because he was sorry for hurting her. Sorry for hurting all of them, really. There wasn’t a thing about his current life he didn’t regret, he realized.

She eventually calmed. “You’re not going to run now, are you?”

“No,” he promised. “I don’t know exactly what I’m going to do, to be honest.”

“You’ve got to let us help you.” Hazel’s voice was urgent, and she took his hands in hers. “You know we’ll do anything for you.”

“I won’t have you killing humans and demigods.”

“Nico, Father’s right. These cultists have to be stopped, whatever it takes.”

He pulled his hands away. “Yes. I’ll do it. You can’t.”

“Nico-”

“No. You don’t understand what it does to you. I don’t even feel . . . human anymore. I don’t have nightmares because there’s nothing worse my psyche can do to me than I’ve already done to it. You know what my worst dreams are?” He looked into Hazel’s golden eyes. “I’m here, at Camp Half-Blood. I’m a teenager again. My friends are around. I have Will. I’m happy and in love and innocent. I hate those dreams, Hazel, I hate them because I have to wake up from them.”

Another tear ran down Hazel’s face, and Nico cursed himself for not controlling his tongue. He awkwardly brushed the tear aside. “Please don’t cry. I’m not worth-”

“I swear, Nico di Angelo, I will hit you harder if you finish that sentence.” Hazel’s voice was fierce. 

Nico almost smiled. That was the sister he knew. “I missed you so much.”

Hazel looked at him penetratingly. “I’ve only been here for ten minutes, and I can already tell . . . this is killing you, Nico. Maybe the reason you’ve come back to camp is to find yourself again. Find a better way to fight this battle, a way that won’t keep destroying you from the inside out.”

He looked away from her. Unfortunately, now, right in his line of sight, he could see Will. Robbie and Dawn were playing together with their parents watching. Will was such a good father to his niece, such a good person . . .

Hazel followed his gaze. “You still love him, don’t you?” Nico didn’t answer, which was an answer in itself. “Good. He was always good for you. You were always good for him, too.”

“He should find someone else,” Nico said.

“He tried. It didn’t work out. Gavin was a great guy, I liked him, but it was pretty obvious to anyone who’d ever seen you and Will together that it just wasn’t the same.” She touched Nico’s face. “You two had something you should never have let go of. Maybe now, you can correct your mistake.”

Nico shook his head sadly. “There’s no going back, _sorellina_. What we had is gone.”

“But you still have a future. I know you’re hurting right now, but you can’t give up hope. Not for Will, and not for you. We’re going to help you, brother of mine. This war will be over one day, and if you can forgive yourself, you’ll have something to live for.” She took his hands again. “I can’t stay; I have my duties. I’m a trainer at Camp Jupiter now, did you know? But I will be staying in touch. I love you, big brother.”

Nico couldn’t speak through his tight throat, so he just hugged her.

***

Not long after Hazel left, Annabeth pulled Nico into a private room in the Big House. She set her laptop on a table and opened it up.

“I want all the information you have on these cultists,” she said. “Names, places, dates, artifacts you know they have, absolutely everything. Start talking.”

So he did, while she typed and interjected occasional questions. Annabeth’s matter-of-fact approach made it easier to turn his private war into a series of data points.

Nonetheless, it took a toll on him. Eventually, he had to call a halt.

“Can we finish this tomorrow?” Nico asked, rubbing his hands over his face. “I don’t like thinking about it.”

Annabeth saved her data and closed the laptop, looking at Nico with calm, sympathetic eyes. “Of course. And I’m sorry. I should’ve realized how hard this would be on you. This is exactly why I thought Piper should go in first.”

“What are you going to do with all of this?”

“Analyze, analyze, analyze. See what other routes there might be for thwarting them.” She tilted her head. “What exactly will happen if they succeed in their aims?”

Nico sighed. “Well, you remember when Thanatos was chained, how monsters wouldn’t stay dead, and even life and death among the Greeks and Romans became malleable.” Annabeth nodded. “That’s the first effect. The cycles of death and life will be interrupted. As fewer people stay dead, the balance will be that fewer are born. That in itself isn’t so much of a problem. It will be a problem when it begins to extend to nature. Our bodies run on the deaths of plants and animals. People will starve, but not die.”

Annabeth shuddered. “Go on.”

“Of course, that’s only one scenario. With the ancient gods tied up, it could be that other forces will step in. Azrael is associated with the Abrahamic faiths, which are extremely powerful at this point in history. There’s also Lord Yama, a Hindu god with millions of believers. Other death avatars and deities from other religions are still active, but I’d say Azrael and Yama are the big players.”

“Will they be able to mitigate the effects?”

“Somewhat. But even they aren’t the real Powers. The Olympians, the Egyptian and Norse gods, the pantheons of all the gods we know here on Earth are nothing compared to the Powers that run the universe. If all else fails, they’ll step in. And whenever they’ve had to do that in history? The whole world has changed. We’re talking extinction-level events. I doubt the human race as we know it will survive.”

“Like the Flood narratives from the ancient Near East,” Annabeth murmured.

“Just like that. Only, the whole world will be affected, not just one part. It’s the consequence of global civilization. We will all take the fall for their actions.”

Annabeth took this all in, nodding slowly. “I don’t envy you your duties, Nico, but given the potential consequences? I’d take them up myself if I thought it was the only way. I have a son now, and I would do anything to make the world a better place for him. But maybe we can find a way to end this without having to slaughter all these people.”

“I would . . . I would appreciate that.” Nico slumped in his chair. “You don’t know what it does to you, killing.”

“I know what being alone does to you. I know what having a terrible burden placed on you by the gods feels like. I know what it’s like to be desperate to please your parent.” Annabeth reached out and touched his hand. “We all know that, Nico, and while none of us ever wants to be in your position, there’s no way we’re letting you fight this war alone. And before you object, it’s not up to you. Not any longer.”

She stood up and shouldered her laptop bag. “We’ll be staying in the Poseidon cabin tonight if you need anything. We’ll talk more tomorrow. Have hope, Nico.”

Nico wished he could.

***

Will wandered down to his cottage, happy to leave the infirmary behind. He’d hoped to see Nico at some point, but he knew Annabeth had Plans for him. Will only hoped her superior brain could find a way to free him from his unwanted task.

And, yet again, Nico was waiting for him, sitting on the front step of the cottage in the evening twilight. He looked unspeakably weary. Grass had died around his feet. That took Will by surprise; Nico had learned to control his emotions as a teen so that he didn’t accidentally kill plant life.

Will crouched down by him. “Are you going to run?” he asked.

Nico shook his head.

“What do you need?”

There was no answer. Carefully, moving the way a person facing an injured animal might, Will reached out and took Nico’s hand.

What his healer’s senses found wasn’t so much pain as emptiness. Utter brokenness. 

Will wondered if he’d done the right thing. He hadn’t meant for all of Nico’s friends to show up, but with the birth of Piper and Jason’s child, it had been inevitable. The one good thing was that Nico hadn’t bolted. Perhaps, on some level, Nico had wanted, even needed, this. Perhaps his breaking was inevitable. At least here, Nico was safe and among those who wanted to help him. Will hoped he could.

“Will,” Nico finally said.

“I’m here.”

Nico looked at him with those shattered-glass eyes. “I can’t do this anymore.”

“I know.” Will gently helped him to his feet. “It’s okay. I’m here.”

Will ushered his former love into the cottage. Sela was there, feeding Dawn, and Will heated up some soup for the adults. Nico ate without protest, without speaking. He watched as Will put Dawn to bed, singing a childhood lullaby to her.

After she was asleep, Will led Nico to his bedroom and gave him a set of pajamas. This time, Nico accepted the offer of comfort. This time, he climbed under the covers with Will, let Will hold him.

“You’re going to be okay, Nico,” Will whispered. “I promise.”


	5. Here With Me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nico's guard finally comes down, Samhain is discussed, and the heart has its own wisdom.

Nico was warm.

As he drifted up toward consciousness, that was the first thing he was aware of. He was warm in a way he hadn’t been since . . .

Will. The events of the previous day trickled back into Nico’s mind, and he remembered how he’d gone to sleep in Will’s arms. He could hear Will’s heartbeat and breathing under his ear, smell the mixture of infirmary, male sweat and the scent he had long ago identified simply as “sunshine,” that was uniquely Will.

Part of his mind took him to task for accepting the comfort Will offered. He wasn’t worthy of it, he needed to keep his mind on his mission, he couldn’t afford to weaken now.

He also remembered how, years ago, whenever he’d get too much into his own head, Will would tell him, “Just let yourself be here with me.”

He was here with Will now. The last six years had taken a terrible toll on Nico’s mind and body. He’d done everything his father had asked, denied himself every comfort, cut off every link to the life he’d created for himself. Wasn’t it enough? Couldn’t he let it go, at least for a while?

Didn’t he need to?

Yes, he decided. For now, he’d be here with Will. Whatever came next, whenever the war dragged him back in, he’d do his duty. But in this moment, he’d take what Will had to offer.

Nico closed his eyes and fell back to sleep.

***

In his dream, Nico stood in another hotel room, bland and generic save only for the revenant standing vigil by the window. Kayla. Outside was a city, but Nico had no idea which city it was.

What was interesting was Paul, the mysterious necromancer Nico had seen before, Kayla’s lover and Dawn’s father. Kayla’s killer. He was communing with someone who wasn’t entirely there. Whatever the figure was, it was shrouded in darkness. Nico felt, instinctively, that this being, whatever it was, was connected to the Underworld.

“They’re frightened, but I can persuade them,” Paul told the mysterious figure. “Like revenants, all you have to do is know their lever. When the time comes, they’ll fall in line.”

“Don’t make promises you can’t keep,” the figure hissed. It was a proper hiss, too. “Cowards will do me no good.”

“With all respect, Master, fear is an excellent motivating force. Like love. Like hate. Regardless of where the Angel is, the threat of him is enough to make the others close ranks.”

“I hope you are right, Pwyll. As should you.”

Paul ducked his head in a submissive gesture. “All will be ready by Samhain, Master. Soon, Tartarus will be yours.”

“And the child?”

“I will find her.” There was utter, obsessive determination in Paul’s voice. “There are a limited number of places she can be, and I’m narrowing them down. When I do find her, there will be nothing left in our way.”

The shadowed figure breathed a sigh that sounded like air escaping a tomb. “Good. It is a terrible thing to be forgotten, Pwyll. A terrible thing, indeed.”

“None shall ever forget you again, Master. I promise you that much. The fall of the Olympians is nigh . . .”

And Nico woke again.

***

“Samhain.”

Will started awake at the word. “Hng?”

It took him a few seconds to reorient himself and remember falling asleep with Nico the previous night. Said ex-boyfriend was still resting against him, but staring off into space.

“I had a dream,” said Nico. “I saw that Paul guy again. He was talking to . . . something, and he said everything would be ready by Samhain.”

“Samhain.” Will kicked his brain into gear. “I’m afraid I don’t know a damn thing about it, except that it’s a Celtic holiday, right?”

Nico lifted himself off of Will’s chest and brushed his hair back. “Yeah. It sort of got turned into Halloween, as I remember.”

“That gives us almost three months to figure out what’s going on, then.”

“I wouldn’t count on that.” Nico threw the covers back and got out of bed. “Paul talked about Dawn, said he was narrowing down where she is. There are ways around the magical shielding for this camp, Will, and Kayla could be forced to tell him where it is.”

Will turned that over in his head, sitting up. “You think he didn’t know that Kayla’s – that she was a demigod?” It hurt to use the past tense, but she was no longer alive in any meaningful manner.

“I think if he knew what to ask her, he’d have asked it by now. Revenants don’t exactly volunteer information. Depending on what he is and what his abilities are, he might have picked up on her supernatural side, but most of us are pretty tight-lipped about our true natures among mortals. Even the ones we may love.”

Will imagined a whirlwind romance. Kayla, out in the mortal world, trying to live a normal life. She had fallen off the radar, he remembered. His only contact with her was a couple of birthday cards. He’d accepted her silence with sadness, knowing it wasn’t unusual for demigods to disappear into the mortal world for at least a few years. And then she’d learned she was pregnant, and that the father of her child wasn’t who she thought he was . . .

“Will.” Nico’s voice shook Will out of his brooding. When Will looked up, Nico had taken off his pajama top. “I’ll help her. I swear I will.”

There was a palpable difference in Nico versus the previous day. He’d been utterly despondent when Will had found him on the cottage’s step. Now, though, he seemed focused, even energized.

“Looks like you’re feeling better today,” Will observed.

Nico pulled on his shirt from the previous day before answering. “Yeah.” He glanced up at Will through a curtain of hair. “Thank you.”

“Anytime. You should talk to Annabeth about this Samhain stuff. Also, I know that Brighid knows a lot about Celtic myths and legends.”

“I’ll talk to her, then. Annabeth and I were already planning to finish our talk.”

“Right.” Will stripped off his shirt and started rummaging through his drawers for clothes to wear after he showered. Out of the corner of his eye, he caught Nico staring. The son of Hades quickly looked away, blushing, when he realized Will could see him.

Nico hastily buckled on his chain belt. “I need a shower. I’ll . . . see you at breakfast?”

Will smiled at him. “Of course. I’ve got to get the infirmary up and running, but one of the privileges of my position is that I can pass it off onto my younger siblings and eat regular meals when I want to.”

Nico nodded and then left quickly. It was reminiscent of how he’d behaved before they’d gotten together as teens. There’d be some flirtation or indication of interest followed by a retreat on Nico’s part, leaving Will both frustrated and intrigued.

Will sighed and went to take a shower, weighing in his mind what it would cost him to fall for Nico all over again.

***

Naturally, camp gossip beat everything but the speed of sound.

“Guess what? Marko was leaving his cabin this morning – you know how early those Apollos wake up – and he spotted Nico di Angelo heading back to the Hades cabin. He was coming from the direction of, get this, Will’s cottage!”

“What? Tell me more!”

“So? Maybe he was up all night. You don’t know with that guy.”

“In yesterday’s clothes?”

“He wears all black every day, how could you even tell?”

“So it was just a coincidence he was making a straight line from Will’s cottage to his cabin?”

“They did used to be boyfriends, and according to Jules, they’re still seriously into each other. Maybe they’re rekindling.”

“Ooh, that’s a pretty thought. Will’s hot, Nico’s hot . . .”

“Nico’s _scary_.”

“Scary _hot_.”

“I’ll bet Will’s a great lover.”

“Why do you care, Debra? You’re a girl.”

“What, I can’t fantasize?”

“Well, I sure wouldn’t mind being the creamy center in that sandwich.”

“You’re a ho, Jer.”

“Have I ever claimed to be anything else?”

“Shh! He’s coming this way!”

The small gathering collectively shut up as Nico approached, making a beeline for Brighid.

“Brighid, what do you know about Celtic mythology?” he asked without preamble or acknowledging any of the others.

The Ares head counselor gave a short laugh. “What don’t I know? I grew up on those stories. Well, and Norse myths, too.”

Nico nodded shortly. “If you’ve got time, Annabeth and I need to pick your brain. It’s important.”

“My next activity isn’t for another hour,” Brighid said, getting up. “What do you need to know?”

They walked away, talking. Jer sighed.

“He’s so damn hot.”

***

Sitting around a table with Annabeth and Brighid, Nico told them about his dream.

“Pwyll?” Brighid asked. “The only Pwyll I know of is Pwyll Pen Annwn.”

That interested Nico. “Annwn is the Celtic realm of the dead.”

Brighid nodded. “Exactly. The story is that Pwyll, a prince, stumbled into Annwn and offended Arawn, the ruler there, by chasing some of his hounds away from their prey. To make up for it, Pwyll and Arawn changed places for a year and a day. Pwyll defeated one of Arawn’s enemies and, more importantly, refused to pork Arawn’s wife, so they became friends, and Pwyll was given the name Pwyll Pen Annwn, or ‘head of Annwn.’”

Annabeth typed away at her laptop. “Do you think this guy could’ve been talking to Arawn?”

“It’s a symptom of the direction my life has taken that I can say I’ve met Arawn, and I’m certain it wasn’t him. Most of the Celtic gods are inactive, though a few have been folded into modern Paganism.” Nico thought about his impressions of the shadowed being. “Whoever it was felt . . . ancient. Like a distant memory. The Olympians and Roman gods have reinvented themselves over the years, but I’ve met some of the true ancient deities, the ones who have been forgotten by all but a few. And this one said he was forgotten.”

“Well, my mom was always more interested in the Morrigan and Scathach, so I’m afraid I can’t be too much help with ancient-almost-forgotten death gods,” said Brighid.

Annabeth turned her laptop around. “What I’m coming up with is a few Celtic deities associated with death, including Arawn, Mannanan, Donn and Cichol. Cichol seems to be the oldest. He was leader of the Fomorians at one time, before Mannanan.”

Nico absorbed this. “Brighid, tell me everything you know about Samhain.”

Brighid had a silver triskelion necklace on, which she fiddled with as she spoke. “In a nutshell, it’s a festival that, well, welcomes the dark half of the year in. End of the harvest, time to slaughter livestock; basically, you’d light bonfires, eat a lot, get drunk and hopefully get lucky. You also left offerings for the _Aos Si_ and your dead loved ones. It’s the time of the year when the veil between worlds is the thinnest and the dead visit their relatives. The Christians replaced all of that with All Hallow’s Eve, All Saints’ Day and All Souls’ Day. Americans just kept Halloween and made up shit about dressing in costumes and eating candy.”

“The time when the veil is thinnest, eh?” Nico leaned back in his chair. “So, let’s speculate that this Paul, or Pwyll, has a connection to an ancient Celtic god. The god wants to manifest in our world. Right now, it can’t. But on Samhain, with the veil at its thinnest, Paul is planning something that he hopes will punch right through.”

“It’s as good a working theory as any,” Annabeth said, still typing. “Of course, we could be wrong on any of the particulars, but I think it holds together so far. I’ll keep researching on my end. Nico, if you have any more dreams, let me know. Brighid, if you think of anything from Celtic myths that might help, tell Nico. I’ll contact Camp Jupiter about the former Legionnaires you told me about, Nico. I’m also going to try to figure out where they’re keeping their artifacts.”

“I’ve been trying to figure that out for years myself,” said Nico. “If we could take those away, it would set the whole movement back to square one.” He stood and stretched. “I need to clear my head.”

Brighid stood, too, her blue eyes alight with challenge. “Ares cabin’s at the arena. Want to play with us?”

“Sounds fun. Annabeth, thanks. I’ll keep you updated on everything.”

Annabeth closed her laptop and smiled at him. “Anytime, and you’d better. It’s good to have you back, Nico. It really is.”

“It’s – it’s good to be back. It is.” And it was, though nothing could ever be quite the same.

***

Will had to admit he was distracted. Thinking about Nico, about how natural it had felt to sleep with Nico in his arms, about the kiss they’d shared . . . there was still something between them, something strong and real. The question was, what was there to do about it? Nico wasn’t the same, Will wasn’t the same. Could they even –

“That’s it!” Marko snapped as Will accidentally collided with him yet again. “You’re out for the day, Dr. Moony.”

“Sorry,” Will stammered.

Not even slightly mollified, Marko gave him a push toward the door. “Come back when you can keep your mind on the job instead of your ex.”

“Hey!”

“Don’t even try to deny it, Solace. Vamoose!”

Will sulked off to his cottage, where he picked up Dawn earlier than usual. He took her back to the main campground. As usual, she got a lot of attention from the campers, especially the Aphrodite girls. For some reason, one of them felt the need to tell him that Nico was at the arena.

Since Dawn was wandering that general direction anyway, Will decided to check on him. Jason and Percy were working with the Ares and Nike campers as well as Nico, and Will picked up Dawn and watched.

Nico was talking to a Nike girl named Marisa, helping her work on her form.

“You’re trying to match George here’s moves,” Nico said, nodding at her opponent. “That’s not going to work for you. If you want to win against him, you’ve got to play a different game.” He adjusted her stance. “You’ll never be able to match his reach and upper-body strength. That means you have to take advantage of what you have, like your agility and, more importantly, your brain. How do you think I beat lunkheads like Percy and Jason?”

“Hey! Percy resents that!” Jason protested.

Under Nico’s coaching, Marisa won the next spar. It reminded Will so much of watching Nico teach when they were both teens. He wasn’t afraid to lay the hurt on idiot Ares campers who thought size and strength was everything, but at the same time, he had no end of patience for young campers just learning the way of the sword.

Will sat in the stands while Dawn amused herself with the Aphrodite girls. He couldn’t stop watching Nico. It was almost as if the last six years hadn’t happened. Nico, still here, still training kids, still with Will . . .

Gods. This couldn’t turn out well. Could it?

The practice broke, and Nico came over to Will.

“Thought you were in the infirmary today,” he said.

Will made a face. “I was, but Marko kicked me out. He’s such a mother hen.”

Nico gave him a deadpan look. “Hi, Pot. Have you met my friend the Kettle?”

The Aphrodite girls giggled. Will gave them a withering glance.

“Nito! Uh!” Dawn demanded, raising her arms. She hadn’t quite mastered her “k” sounds yet.

Nico picked her up, completely unselfconscious. She immediately latched onto his earring.

“Ow,” Nico commented.

“Here, let me help.” Will set about trying to keep Dawn’s small, but stubborn, fingers from pulling out the earring.

There was a squeal from the general direction of the Aphrodite campers. Will resolutely ignored it, though he was aware of how this probably looked to them. Dawn’s two daddies.

The thought hit Will unexpectedly hard. For a moment, he imagined having Nico back in his life, raising Dawn with him. Their eyes met as Will finally persuaded Dawn to let go of the shiny. And Will somehow read in Nico’s eyes exactly the same thoughts as he’d been having.

The Aphrodite girls squealed again. Irritation flickered over Nico’s face, and he handed Dawn to Will.

“I need a shower,” declared the son of Hades. “I’ll see you at dinner?”

“Of course.” Will watched Nico go. When he turned around, Piper had somehow appeared at his elbow. Jason took Cora from her arms, cooing over his baby. It was incredibly adorable.

In a few moments, Piper managed to maneuver Will away from everyone else. “So, scuttlebutt among my siblings is that Nico was seen walking away from your cottage early this morning.”

Crap.

“He slept there last night,” Will admitted, trying to keep his voice casual.

Piper gave him a Look. “And where did he sleep?”

“Does it matter?” Piper gave him another Look. “Okay, with me, but nothing happened.”

“So, what happened?” Piper asked.

Double crap. Piper was simply not bullshittable when it came to one’s love life. Will sighed and told her about the events of the previous night. “I swear, Piper, we just slept. He needed comfort, that’s all.”

She nodded, accepting his words. “Are you still in love with him?”

“I . . .” Will fumbled for words and didn’t find them. “Piper, I just don’t know. I don’t. He’s changed so much. So have I.”

“Have you? Has he?” Piper squeezed his arm. “You’ve both grown, and Nico’s been forced into a war, but at heart, you’re still the same people. The heart has its own wisdom, Will; don’t ignore it.”

***

Jason, Piper, Percy and Annabeth left the following day. Will watched them go with some regret. Nico was coming more out of his shell, acting more like the person Will had known before, with them. There was a fear that he would regress once they were gone.

But he didn’t. If anything, Nico seemed to settle down even more. He continued to teach swordfighting to the campers, who flocked to his classes. The inhibitor ring faded from his hand, but Nico made no effort to shadow-travel. As camp started to wind down for the summer, Nico remained in contact with Annabeth, who was making progress in her quest to find information on the cultists.

He was spending more time with Will, Dawn and Sela, too. At one point, Nico sat down with Sela and asked her to tell him absolutely everything about the events around Dawn’s birth. Whatever they spoke about, both were subdued for the rest of the day. Afterward, though, Sela seemed more relaxed around Nico.

And Will’s heart was telling him that Nico, however injured, still had the same heart Will had fallen in love with.

One afternoon, Will spotted Nico up on Half-Blood Hill, looking out toward Long Island Sound. Curious, Will climbed the hill. Nico gave him a brief glance as Will came to stand beside him, then returned his gaze to the Sound.

“Drachma for your thoughts?” Will asked.

“I was thinking . . . I was thinking about the night of the battle against Gaea, when you, Lou and Cecil met me up here.” Nico gave a little chuckle. “That silly face-paint of yours. You all failed at being stealthy, you know. If it hadn’t been for Lou’s Mist, you’d have been toast.”

Will smiled at the memory. “Yeah, no one ever accused me of being Secret Agent Man.” He glanced over at Nico again. “Seeing you there, though, that’s one of my favorite memories. I had the craziest urge to grab you and kiss you silly when I saw you.”

“You should be glad you didn’t, with the mood I was in.”

“Homicidal, as I recall.”

The smile faded from Nico’s face. “Yeah. I really wanted to kill Octavian. If only I’d known then . . .”

“You don’t want to kill, Nico, I know that,” said Will. “Whatever the reason was that you ended up here, you’ve stayed because you have hope now.”

“I’ve stayed for you.” Nico turned to face Will. “I still love you. I never stopped.”

The declaration took Will’s breath away. It was spoken the way Nico had always said “I love you” – almost without sentiment, like it was a self-evident fact.

“Nico . . .”

“I don’t ask anything of you, Will. I know we can’t have what we used to.” He looked down. “It’s silly to hope for that.”

Will remembered Piper’s words, that the heart had its own wisdom. Maybe it was time for him to listen to it.

“Nico, what do you want? Right now, right here, what do you want?”

“It doesn’t matter.”

“It matters to me.” Will moved to face him. “It hurt when you left, it hurt like nothing else. I know now that you never wanted to, and whatever you’ve done, however we’ve both grown and changed . . . I still see you, the boy I met on this hill. You’re still brave. You’re still giving and kind at heart. And I want to know what it is you hope for, if anything. Tell me what it is that you want.”

Nico looked away and was silent. For a long moment, Will thought he wasn’t going to answer.

And then it all came bursting forth. “What do I want, Will? I want this. I want to stay here, the only place I can remember feeling at home. I want to keep teaching sword classes and thumping sense into thick-headed Ares kids. I want my friends back. I want my sister back in my life. And I want you. I want to be with you the way we were when we were teens. I want more. I want a life with you.” Nico seemed to run out of breath, and he gulped down more air. “I want peace, Will. I want to be able to throw away my daggers and never feel blood on my hands again. I want to pick little Dawn up and – and not feel like I’m leaving bloody handprints on her.”

There was no planning it, no thinking about it, even. Will strode forward, pulling Nico into his arms, pressing their lips together. Nico clung to him, making helpless noises as he kissed Will back fiercely.

Will broke the kiss and pressed his forehead against Nico’s, giving in to the truth he felt in his heart. “Nico. I still love you. I still believe in you.”

“Will.” Nico pulled back far enough to look into Will’s eyes. “I want that night we never had. I want you to be my first. I’ve never wanted anyone else.”

Words stuck in Will’s throat. Nico leaned in and kissed him again, a slow, searing kiss like none they’d ever shared before. Will could sense Nico’s emotions, his love, his passion, his need. They echoed in Will.

Nico drew back, leaving Will wanting more. “You know what I want now. The only question is if I can have it.”

Nico walked away, down the hill. Will stayed where he was, shaken to the core.

***

The heart has its own wisdom. Will knew Piper was right. 

On the surface, it didn’t make any sense. There was so much space between what he and Nico had been and what they were. So much sorrow, so much pain, so many years of life taking them in different directions.

Only . . . had it? Will was raising Kayla’s daughter. Nico was hunting Kayla’s killer. Somehow, they’d ended up in the same place. As a demigod, Will knew that coincidences were usually more than coincidences for the children of the Olympians.

Perhaps they’d always been meant to reconnect, even in times like these.

The campers were gathered at the bonfire as Will made his way to the Hades cabin. He hoped to find Nico there, and he was not disappointed.

Nico’s hair was wet, as if he’d just showered, and he was wearing only a pair of loose, black bottoms. He was beautiful, to Will’s eyes, always had been. He wasn’t very tall, but his body was perfectly proportioned, long and lean and hard with muscle, like a dancer’s. Even with his skin marred by scars and tattoos, he was gorgeous. 

Nico looked at Will, saying nothing.

“This could be a bad idea,” Will said, breaking the silence.

Nico nodded. “It could be the worst idea.”

“But I don’t think it is.”

“Neither do I.”

And with that, they were in each other’s arms, kissing like the world was ending. Will ran his hands over Nico’s hard torso as Nico fisted his hands in Will’s shirt. Will was never quite sure how they got it off, but he was finally skin-to-skin with the man he loved, and he didn’t care how it happened. His mouth wandered from Nico’s mouth down to his neck, drawing soft moans.

Will stopped kissing him long enough to chuckle. “Remember the first time I gave you a hickey?”

Nico gave a breathless laugh in response. “I was furious. Wouldn’t leave this cabin until you got me some salve to take care of it.”

Will kissed his pulse. “I brought some with me. It’s in my med kit, along with some other things we might need, depending on how far you want to take this.”

Nico’s hand found Will’s belt and the med kit on it. “I want everything with you, Will. Everything. I’m sick of being alone. Of feeling nothing.”

Placing his hand against the sun tattooed on Nico’s chest, Will promised him, “Don’t worry. I’m going to make you feel very, very good.”

***

Nico hadn’t expected it to be like this.

Oh, he’d expected Will’s touch to be gentle and loving. He’d expected the physical pleasure. He’d expected the overwhelming need.

What he hadn’t expected was how utterly vulnerable, naked inside and out, he would feel. If it hadn’t been with Will, it would’ve been terrifying.

But it was with Will, so he let himself be swept away. He felt cherished, loved, as Will kissed his scars. He gave himself over to Will, who was over him, around him, in him. He forgot everything else, crying out in Italian as he forgot everything but the language of his birth, including his own name.

(But not Will’s, never Will’s, the name he whispered and moaned and screamed . . .)

After the pleasure, after Will tenderly cleaned them both up and wrapped Nico in his strong, warm arms, murmuring words of love and comfort, Nico finally allowed his tears to fall. And he was okay.


	6. Death Takes a Holiday

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Even Nico can be happy--for a time.

As always, Will awoke with the sun. He couldn’t see it in the windowless Hades cabin, but he could feel sunrise in his bones. In the dim light of Underworld flames, it took him a moment to orient himself.

The previous night came back to Will as he processed that it was Nico curled into his side, Nico who was still deeply, peacefully asleep. For a moment, Will wondered if it had truly been wise to begin a sexual relationship with Nico right now. They’d been apart for six years, and reunited for barely a month, after all.

But it had felt right. It had felt peaceful, natural, to make love to Nico. And Will couldn’t help but think the emotional release Nico had experienced afterward had been important in some unnamable way. For all these years, Nico had been forcing himself to continue, stoic and alone, not letting himself grieve for what he’d lost in this war. Maybe now, he could find peace.

Carefully, Will disentangled himself from his lover, slipped out of bed and found his clothes. As he finished dressing, Nico stirred.

“Will?”

The thought flashed through Will’s mind that it would not be unreasonable for Nico to think Will was trying to sneak out of the cabin, and that he could draw some very wrong conclusions. Will immediately went back to the bed and sat on the side, leaning down to kiss his boyfriend briefly, but tenderly.

“I have to get to the infirmary,” Will explained. “Go back to sleep. I know you hate being up this early.”

Nico’s eyes were wide in the dim light of the cabin, his face open and vulnerable in a way Will had never seen. “Will, I . . .” He reached up and twisted a couple strands of Will’s hair around his fingers. “Thank you. For last night. I-I know you weren’t sure it if it was a good idea, but . . .”

Will smiled down at him. “Upon reflection, I’ve decided it was a very good idea.” He kissed Nico again, lingering just a little longer. “I love you, and I’m all in. Whatever happens, I’m all in.”

Nico didn’t answer, but instead pulled him down into another kiss. Will could feel conflicting emotions in him, but he wasn’t unhappy or, Will judged, ready to bolt. On the contrary, there was a deep desire to stay. 

In fact, Will suddenly realized that Nico’s emotions were coming through with startling clarity. Will’s empathic abilities were usually geared solely toward healing. He was aware of people’s emotional states, but only in general terms. With Nico, Will had always been especially attuned to his emotions. But never to this degree.

It wasn’t just the intimacy, either. Will had never had this kind of connection with Gavin. Everything was always different, stronger, more intense, with Nico.

Will broke the kiss and caressed Nico’s face. “I’ll see you at breakfast?”

“Yeah.” Nico smiled a little. “I love you.”

One last kiss, and Will left the cabin. As he closed the door, his eye was drawn to movement outside the Apollo cabin. Marko and Maya were just exiting, Marko to head to the infirmary and Maya to go for her morning jog.

They glanced at him.

They did a double-take.

Will gave them a half-hearted wave, resigning himself to the fact that the whole camp would be ablaze with the gossip by the end of breakfast.

He headed to his cottage to take a shower and get ready for the day.

***

Nico was happy.

It took him a little while to identify the emotion, since he hadn’t felt it in so long, but happiness it was. He contemplated it as he washed and dressed. He felt . . . good. Alive. Not just emotionally, but physically. He’d gotten used to constant aches and pains from his injuries, and they were all gone. Apparently, making love with Will had healed them.

Making love with Will . . .

For a moment, all he wanted to do was to find Will, drag him into the nearest empty room, and jump him. In a way, he was glad he hadn’t known how amazing sex could be before, how connected he could feel to his lover. There would’ve been no way he could’ve concentrated on doing his father’s will if he had known. But he was also saddened to think of how much time he’d missed.

Coming back had been so hard, but he could see now it was the best thing that could’ve happened to him. He’d lost sight of everything important, had forgotten why this world was worth fighting for.

Now, he had Will again. He had his friends, his sister. Will had a child, one who needed protection, and there was absolutely nothing Nico wouldn’t do to keep her safe.

In the back of his mind, he knew this was only temporary. He still had a mission, one that felt more important than ever. But he had hope now, hope that there was something for him to come back to, a life after the war ended.

He put everything else out of his mind as he left his cabin, feeling lighter than he had in six years.

Unfortunately, at breakfast, he and Will weren’t able to exchange more than a couple of sentences before Will got called away to consult a difficult case (a couple of Hermes campers had a mishap while attempting to use the Labyrinth to pull a complex prank and currently couldn’t speak anything except Bulgarian), but even that didn’t make much of a dent in Nico’s mood.

After breakfast, he went down to the arena to teach swordplay. The Ares cabin was there, and Nico squared off with George, who was a full head taller than him.

“You have a hickey!” George blurted after a few clashes.

That would’ve bothered Nico when he was a teenager. In fact, it probably would’ve sent him shadow-traveling back to his cabin, perhaps to stay there permanently.

Now? He couldn’t bring himself to care.

“Yes, I have a hickey, and you don’t,” Nico noted, giving George a scary grin. “Also, I’m going to kick your ass.”

He did so with great efficiency, ignoring the snickers of the Ares campers. They hadn’t gotten laid last night.

After the class, Nico decided he and Will had been apart quite long enough and headed for the infirmary.

***

“Oh. My. Gods, we have a positive on that Will Solace-slash-Nico di Angelo hot action!”

“Yeah, I heard Marko and Maya caught Will doing the ol’ walk of shame from the Hades cabin this morning.”

“Aww, everyone’s heard already?”

“Girl, did you see the way they were looking at each other at breakfast today? I kind of expected Eros to spontaneously manifest.”

“Also, George says Nico has a hickey.”

“And Jules spotted a matching hickey on Will’s neck. He says they have that just-got-laid aura about them.”

“Child of Aphrodite here, and yeah, there was definite laying going on last night.”

“That is so intensely hot. Gods, just picture the two of them together . . .”

“Aaaand the straight guy needs to get out of this conversation.”

“Don’t be such a prude, Mark.”

“Not a prude, I just like some boobs with my fantasizing. ‘Bye!”

“You gonna leave, too, Harley?”

“Nah, I can take it. And I’m too lazy to get up right now, so there’s that.”

“Who do you think topped?”

“Jer!”

“Come on, you know you were thinking it!”

“Yes, but I’m tactful enough not to say it.”

“Are you tearing up, Harper?”

“It’s just – it’s just so beautiful! They were in love, and then they got separated for years, and then Nico comes back all battle-scarred and hardened, and Will’s love gives him-”

“Solace?”

“Do you have to make terrible puns at a time like this?”

“It’s what I do.”

“Whatever. I think it’s incredibly romantic.”

“Well, we all agree that Will’s love was giving him something, all right.”

“Don’t be so . . . trashy!”

“Honey, I am trash. I embrace it. Life is fun when you’re trash.”

“Ben! C’mon over and sit.”

“Yeah . . . hey, dude, you look pale. You okay?”

“I can’t unsee what I have seen.”

“Who’s doing what?”

“I was in the infirmary, and Marko needed me to get more salve, so I went to the storage room and opened the door to discover Will and Nico wrapped around each other, attempting to suck each other’s faces off.”

“No way!”

“Way. Anyway, I just stood there like an idiot until Will came up for air. He looked at me and said, without missing a beat, ‘And this, Ben, is why you should never make out in the storage room.’ Nico actually laughed. It was a little scary.”

“Ha! Oh, that’s classic!”

“I wish I’d seen that.”

“I wish I could forget it. Have you ever caught your older sibling in mid-grope?”

“Yep.”

“Oh, yeah.”

“So many times.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Dude, I was here for the great Jake Mason/Drew Tanaka debacle of ‘12. You don’t even want to know what I’ve seen.”

***

Will was, truthfully, a little embarrassed by the supply closet incident, especially when Marko gave him a disappointed-by-Dad look. Nico, surprisingly, didn’t appear to be bothered at all. He held Will’s hand as they went for a walk through camp.

“You were always so reticent about PDAs before,” Will noted.

Nico made a noise of agreement. “It seems silly to me now. Why shouldn’t I want everyone to know we’re together?” He looked down. “And it took me a longer time than it should’ve to understand that being gay is nothing shameful. Being an assassin, on the other hand . . .”

Will squeezed his hand. “Don’t go down that road. Just be here with me right now.”

Nico’s smile was gentle as he looked at his boyfriend. “As long as I can.”

They wandered a bit, picking up Dawn so Sela could have an afternoon date with Woodrow. Both noticed the sly glances in their direction and the not-so-subtle giggling and pointing. Both ignored it. Nico noticed something else as the afternoon wore on, though.

“Jules has a boyfriend, I see.” He nodded toward Jules and Athena son Darren Garfield, who were sitting by the hearth, holding hands and chatting, faces close together.

“Yep,” said Will, and watched as Demeter daughter Missy Tranh approached them, sat across their laps, and kissed them both. Nico’s eyes popped, much to Will’s amusement. “And there’s their mutual girlfriend.”

“Seems complicated.”

“They’ve made it work for over a year now. Jules is pansexual; he’ll flirt with everyone and everything, possibly including hydras. Darren and Missy are both level-headed enough to not take it personally.”

“Still seems complicated.”

“No threesomes, then. Got it.” Nico rolled his eyes, making Will laugh. “Tell you what: We’ll focus on making us work before we do anything else, okay?”

They walked in silence for a space more before Nico started to speak again. “I’ve been happy today, Will. I want you to know that. You always made me happy, even when I was a moody Goth teenager.”

“Then hold onto that.” Will stooped and picked up Dawn. “You can’t let this mission your father’s sent you on define you. You’re more than Hades’s heavy.”

“So you keep telling me,” Nico sighed.

“Well, if you’d just believe me, I could stop repeating myself.” Will took Nico’s hand. “Come on. Time for this girl’s nap.”

***

Nico managed to restrain himself until Dawn was asleep, and was rather proud of the fact that he and Will, locked in a passionate embrace, were able to get through the door of Will’s bedroom (and even close it!) with a minimum of bruises.

“Are we a little eager?” Will murmured teasingly against Nico’s mouth.

Nico responded by practically ripping Will’s shirt off. “I haven’t been able to think about anything but you all day. What’s your diagnosis, Doctor Solace?”

Will chuckled. “I think I’ve got some doctor’s orders for you.” With that, he more or less pushed Nico down onto the bed, trailing kisses down his lover’s neck.

Nico moaned, his mind going back to the previous night, when Will had very effectively reduced him to a quivering mass of nerve endings. “You’re going to teach me everything, all of the amazing things you did to me last night.”

“Oh, am I?” Nico felt Will smile against his neck. “That’ll take a while.”

“Are you bragging, Solace?”

“Well, I don’t want to say I’m a great lover, but . . .”

Nico hooked one leg around Will’s and flipped them so Nico was on top. He stripped off his shirt and leaned over Will. “If you’re not going to share your wisdom, Doctor, I suppose I’m going to just have to experiment.”

Will ground upward against Nico’s hips, and they both groaned. “I want you to know that I don’t have any problems with that at all.”

Neither of them spoke much after that.

***

In the following days, Nico settled into a routine. He taught swordplay to the campers, ate at the dining pavilion, and educated young demigods about the Underworld. He even helped a little around the infirmary, reorganizing the storage room the way he had as a teen. He moved into the cottage with Will, Sela and Dawn. He always set aside some time every day to spend with Dawn, and he spent every night in Will’s arms. It was blissful, perfect.

It was an idyll that couldn’t last.

The final day of camp came and went, and with it, the camp emptied out. A few dozen campers remained, of course, including Marko and Maya and Brighid. The twins were planning a short visit to Guam in a few weeks, but it wasn’t practical for them to live there full-time. One demigod in a home was dangerous enough; two was a guarantee of disaster, and they didn’t want to bring that down on their large, close-knit family.

Harley remained, as always. He’d lived at the camp for more than half his life now and considered it to be home.

It was one late afternoon, just as the sun was setting, after camp had ended, that the hammer finally dropped. Nico realized he should have expected it.

The kids were heading to the amphitheater for a bonfire, and Will and Nico were planning to attend. Sela had just taken Dawn from Will and was about to take her back to the cottage to go to bed.

And the Underworld opened.

Nico felt it, almost heard it. He stiffened, looking around, trying to decide what it was that he was sensing.

“Nico?” Will asked.

“Something’s wrong,” Nico murmured. He noticed that Willa, standing nearby, also seemed uneasy and alert. As a child of Hecate, she had a connection with the Underworld. Perhaps . . .

He called to her. “Willa.”

She started and came over at once. “Nico, what’s happening? Something feels . . . wrong.”

“I don’t know, but I think I can find out with your help.” Nico held out his hand. “Trust me?”

Willa didn’t hesitate. She took his hand. “What do you need me to do?”

“Obscure me. I’m going to try to see through the shadows, but that runs the risk of whatever’s out there seeing me as well. You can hide us. Ready?”

Willa nodded, and Nico let himself sink into the darkening twilight. He felt Willa adjust, spreading Mist around them.

He looked through the shadows.

It was difficult to explain what he saw when he did this. The landscape around him turned translucent, visible only in values of light and darkness. Spirits, some living, some dead, flitted through the camp. And out over the bay, approaching fast, were still more spirits. Nico listened through the shadows and heard exactly what he feared he would.

He pulled back into his own body. Willa stumbled a little beside him, disoriented. Nico, however, couldn’t afford to take the time to help her.

“Brighid, Harley!” he shouted.

“Nico, what is it?” Will asked.

Nico looked at him and Sela. “Sela, you and Dawn need to stay with me. We’ve got trouble.”

Brighid and Harley jogged up. Eerie wails were just beginning to become audible, and the kids were noticing. “What’s going on?” Brighid demanded.

“ _Sluagh sidhe_. You know what they are?” Nico said.

Brighid’s blue eyes narrowed. “Cursed spirits banished from the Celtic Underworld, right?”

Nico nodded shortly. “They’re headed in, fast. We have maybe three minutes. Celestial bronze won’t hurt them; we need iron. Steel will do.”

“Steel and iron?” Harley asked. “Yeah, we can do that. Gina! Loc! Billy!” He ran off, calling to his siblings.

“How do we fight them?” Brighid asked, all business.

“They’re only semi-corporeal. Iron fixes them in physical form, and then you can destroy them. Be careful; they’re fast and brutal and can solidify long enough to gut you if you don’t have cold iron.” Nico drew his sword and his steel dagger. “Tell anyone who doesn’t fight to get to their cabins. I don’t know if the thresholds will protect them, but it’s better than nothing.”

Brighid turned away and began shouting orders. Will stepped to Nico’s side. “What can I do?”

“Get the infirmary ready.” Nico saw Will’s eyes flick to Sela and Dawn. “I will protect them. I swear it on the River Styx.”

Will nodded reluctantly, but as always, moved to do his duty. Nico turned his eyes toward the direction he knew the _sluagh sidhe_ would be coming from, and he took Sela’s arm and began to escort her in the direction of the Hades cabin. It would, he knew, hold off hostile spirits. It was just a matter of getting there in time.

They didn’t. Just as they reached the green, the _sidhe_ descended.

They were everywhere, wraiths with the appearance of tormented, emaciated humans, their screams filling the air with madness-inducing rage and fear. And they were coming straight for Nico.

No, they were coming for Dawn. The infant wailed and clung to Sela, who hunched over, trying to physically wrap herself around her charge. Nico’s sword and dagger ripped the spirits apart, but they kept coming, and there was no way he could stop them all.

An idea suddenly occurred to him: The dead could protect against the dead. He reached out to the bones under the ground, the spirits bound to his authority. Skeletons erupted from the ground around Sela and interlocked their limbs around and over her and Dawn until the two were surrounded by a cage of bone. The _sluagh sidhe_ attacked it, but they couldn’t get past the bones.

Nearby, sounds of battle filtered in. There were always steel weapons on hand for practice, injuries from steel being much easier to heal than those from Celestial bronze. Brighid and her remaining brothers from the Ares cabin wielded steel swords and spears, and Nico noted absently that Maya was firing steel-headed arrows. But there were so many _sidhe_ , and Nico could sense death in the air . . .

“FIRE IN THE HOLE!” Harley’s voice bellowed, amplified by the Hephaestus cabin’s sound system.

It said something about the camp that those words caused everybody, instantly, to drop to the ground and shield their heads. Nico did as well.

The next thing he knew, the screams of the _sidhe_ became absolutely deafening as iron rain fell across the battlefield. Iron and steel shavings which, Nico later learned, had been loaded into a catapult, struck every person and, more importantly, all the _sidhe_.

It was a brilliant move, one which essentially ended the battle. The _sidhe_ were locked into their physical forms now, and they were wounded by the contact with cold iron. Dispatching them took only minutes.

Nico didn’t waste a moment after the coast was clear. He released the bone cage around Sela, grabbed her, and practically dragged her and Dawn into the Hades cabin, where he shut the door.

The cloud nymph was pale, but unhurt, and her main concern seemed to be calming Dawn.

“Is she hurt at all?” Nico asked.

Sela shook her head “I-I don’t think so. Just scared. I wish I had a bottle.”

Nico thought a moment. “Stay in here. Do not open the door, under any circumstances. I’ll be back in a minute.”

He slipped into the shadows. It felt a little strange for a moment; he hadn’t shadow-traveled since arriving at camp. But it was strangely reassuring, too. He emerged in Will’s cottage, where he gathered up a bottle and formula, diapers, wipes, and a pair of Dawn’s pajamas, threw them into a diaper bag, and shadow-traveled back to the Hades cabin.

Sela was concentrating on Dawn so hard she didn’t even comment, but took the supplies from Nico. She changed Dawn, instructing Nico to prepare the bottle, and then sat down on Hazel’s bed to feed the baby. It wasn’t long before Dawn was sleeping soundly. It was only then that Nico noticed tears on Sela’s cheeks.

“Are you all right?” he asked.

She appeared to suddenly notice the tears and wiped them away hastily. “I-I guess now that Dawn’s okay, I’m not.” She gave an unsteady little laugh. “Thank you for protecting us.”

“It’s natural to be shaken, and there’s no need to thank me. You should get some rest, too,” Nico told Cherry. “No undead can get into this cabin without my consent.”

Sela nodded, looking suddenly exhausted, and lay down beside Dawn, pulling Hazel’s blankets over them both. In a few minutes, she, too, was asleep.

Nico kept vigil, all of his senses alert, sword across his knees as he perched on the side of his bed. He’d kept longer, harder vigils, and he hardly noticed the time between Sela lying down to sleep, and Will Solace entering the cabin.

Will’s immediate concern was Dawn, and he went straight to her and Sela and touched them both briefly. Neither stirred, and Will breathed a shuddering breath of relief. He didn’t say anything, but sat down beside Nico on his bed.

After a moment, Nico spoke. “How bad?” He knew there had been death.

Will rubbed shaking hands over his face. “Two. Candace from Demeter and Billy from Hephaestus.”

Nico nodded. “The bodies can be brought here. I’ll perform the funeral rites.”

They sat in silence for a little while. Will eventually broke it. “He knows Dawn is here.” They both knew whom Will was referring to.

“Yeah. The timing makes me think he might have known before, but chose to wait until now to launch an attack because there’d be fewer people here to defend the camp.” He looked at Will. “You need to take Dawn to Camp Jupiter. Pwyll can try getting past the Legion.”

Will looked at him. “You’ll come with us, won’t you?”

Nico looked away. “No. I have to finish this, Will. I let myself get comfortable here, distracted from my duty. Two kids are dead as a result.”

Will grabbed Nico’s shoulder, made him look at him again. “Nico, if you hadn’t come here, you’d be dead, and this guy would be that much closer to his goal of throwing everything into chaos. You can’t blame yourself.”

“Healing from my injuries is one thing. Taking a vacation is another.” Nico forced himself to look at Will’s face, at the hurt behind his eyes. “This has to end. I love you, but I can’t be with you while Pwyll’s still out there, still a threat. I have to finish what I started. For Dawn. For the world.”

“Nico . . .”

“Will. You reminded me that I still have a stake in the world.” Nico let his voice soften, touched Will’s face. “I have to know that you’re safe. Go to Camp Jupiter. Tell Reyna that I want you and Dawn to be under her personal protection. I’ll finish what I started, and if there’s a happy ending to be had, I’ll have it with you after the war is over. I have to do this, Will. You know I do.”

Will made one last attempt at protest. “What about the infirmary here? That’s still my duty.”

“You’ve been running it since you were younger than Marko. He’s more than capable of handling it while you’re gone, and you know it. It’s the off-season, anyway.” Nico drew Will close and kissed him, hoping to ease the sting of what he was asking his lover to do. “Please, Will. I can’t worry about you and fight a war at the same time.”

“You can’t fight a war alone.”

“I won’t. Annabeth’s been working on the problem. I won’t make a move without consulting her.” He ran his hand through Will’s hair. “Go. Keep your child safe. She’s your first duty right now.”

A tear ran down Will’s face, and he pressed his forehead against Nico’s. “Okay. But promise me you’ll come back to me, Nico. Promise me.”

Nico took a deep breath. “I swear, on the River Styx, that if I survive this, I will come back to you, and we’ll have a life together.”

***

When morning came, Will, Sela and Dawn set out for Camp Jupiter, escorted by Brighid and her brothers and accompanied by Willa, who cloaked them in Mist. Nico had messaged Reyna, and she, Hazel and Frank met them along the way and brought them safely to New Rome.

Nico spent the next two days on funeral rites for the fallen Greeks. Once they were completed, he went to New York to consult with Annabeth.

It was time to end the war.


	7. The Dark City

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will misses Nico, and Nico misses Will; Nico has a couple of important conversations; and Annabeth plots.

Will stood on the hill overlooking Camp Jupiter, just inside New Rome. The sun was rising, and as usual, he had a hard time sleeping after sunrise. Every morning, he got out of bed, came to this point, and looked east, toward his home. Toward Nico.

He was sharing a small apartment with Sela and Dawn right next door to Frank and Hazel. Reyna lived across the hall, and all his neighbors were people she knew and trusted. There was always someone nearby in case he needed help, not just at the apartment, but wherever he went. He worked in the Camp Jupiter infirmary alongside people he’d known during his studies, he usually ate meals with Hazel, Frank and Reyna, and there was always someone inviting him somewhere or simply accompanying him on his various wanderings.

Getting up early was, quite frankly, the only way he got to be alone. Reyna was taking her “make sure Nico’s lover and his child are protected” duties quite seriously. He knew it was for his own good, and, more importantly, Dawn’s. Dawn always had an extra protector around, to the point that Sela and Will had worked out a hand-off system so they could each have some alone time.

He knew it was for the best, but still, it got annoying. So he stood, bathed in his father’s light, as Camp Jupiter came to life down the hill and New Rome awakened behind him.

“Good morning,” said a voice from behind him.

Will glanced over his shoulder and nodded at Reyna. “Morning.” The former praetor, now a respected senator, always made sure to announce herself. Will supposed it was an instinct honed from a life among warriors; you didn’t want to surprise a Legionnaire, after all.

Reyna came to stand beside him, and for a few moments, they watched the sunrise in silence.

“How are you doing?” Reyna finally asked.

Will sighed. “Missing my home. Worried about Nico. And . . . a bit unnerved about something.”

“What’s that?”

Will bit his lip, deciding he needed to tell someone. “Nico just went to sleep. He goes to bed mid-morning and sleeps for a few hours. I think he spends a few hours with Annabeth and Percy, and then he settles into the shadows, looking and listening through them. Then he stays awake and alert all night; I think he’s on the move at night, too. Occasionally, he slays a monster. And I don’t know how I know all of this.”

Reyna made a thoughtful noise. “When did this start?”

“I’ve always been more sensitive to Nico’s emotions than other people’s, but . . . I started feeling them with more and more clarity after we became lovers.” Will shook his head. “I thought it would diminish with distance. It hasn’t. I’m as aware of him as I would be if we were in the same room. It’s not like I can see him or hear him, but I can feel his state of consciousness, his moods. It’s enough to put together a rough idea of his routine, which he follows every single day.”

“That’s . . .” Reyna paused as if searching for words. “I’ve never heard of anything like that. How are his moods, by the way?”

“He’s, um, determined.” That seemed a good way to put it. “Some times of the day, he’s a bit lighter-hearted, and I think that’s when Annabeth and Percy are around. Mostly, though, he feels . . . focused, like he’s set everything else aside for his mission. Which, I suppose, he has. I don’t know how much progress he’s made.”

“I worry about him, too,” said Reyna. “I’m glad he came back, but I wish he’d let us help more.”

“He’s accepting help from Annabeth, at least. She’s smart enough to know if he’s planning something suicidal, and she’d send Percy after him. I just . . . I’m so aware of him that it almost hurts. If he were still depressed, I think it would. But I feel helpless, just sitting here.”

Reyna set a hand on his shoulder. “You’re taking care of your child. Nico was right; that is your first duty right now.”

“I know.” Will sighed again. “I’m being pulled in two directions. I know I have to take care of Dawn. Kayla trusted me with her. But I want to be with Nico.”

“Trust him. And trust yourself. You gave him a reason to fight to survive this. I don’t think he had that before.”

Will looked at her and smiled a little. “I hope so. I just wish I could help him more.”

“So do I. I’ve looked into the Legion records of the names Annabeth sent me of the Legionnaires who’ve been involved in this cult and sent her all the information I could. I hope this Paul doesn’t have any other spies in the Legion or former Legionnaires, but there are no guarantees.”

“Hence why Sela and I are having to steal alone-time.”

“Exactly. Nico trusted me with your safety. I’m not letting him down.” Reyna tugged on Will’s arm. “Come on. I’ll buy you coffee.”

Will followed her, but not before looking east one last time, thinking about Nico.

***

Even in his sleep, Nico missed Will.

It was one of the reasons he chose to sleep during the day, so he wouldn’t be tempted to seek out Will in his dreams. The other reason was that it made it much easier for Percy and Annabeth, who were already barely packed into a two-bedroom apartment with their baby. One bedroom was theirs, and the other functioned as Robbie’s nursery and Annabeth’s study. They’d insisted Nico stay with them, which, to Nico, only made sense if Will had asked them to make sure he didn’t fall into depression again. It did make the apartment crowded, though, and Nico keeping an opposite schedule to theirs eased the burden a little. 

He did all his legwork at night, following up on leads Annabeth had researched or he’d discovered in his dreams or in the shadows, and returned in the morning. He ate breakfast with the Chase-Jacksons, and he went to bed on a borrowed air mattress on the nursery/study floor about the time when Percy went to work (at the New York Aquarium on Coney Island, of course) and Annabeth went to school. Annabeth took Robbie with her every day, since there was low-cost child care available on campus. Nico was just happy she’d decided he wouldn’t make a good babysitter.

Robbie wasn’t too sure about Nico, anyway. The little boy was starting to get used to him, but rarely engaged with him directly. Not like Dawn at all. Nico was more sure than ever that her father had a connection to the Underworld.

Therein lay the clue he was currently trying to follow up on. Pwyll Pen Annwn was a friend of Arawn’s; surely Arawn would know if he was still living. Old gods could be difficult to track down, though, and Nico was hoping he’d have more success today than he had in the past few weeks.

He wandered through the strange, in-between world of dreams, trying to avoid getting sucked in by particularly powerful dreamers. Children of Hypnos were his bane, they really were. 

He also had to avoid his own desires. Dreams of Will called to him, dreams of comfort, love, pleasure. Dreams of a future. It would have been easy to fall into those dreams, enjoy them, but Nico was determined not to.

He had a goal now. End the war, survive, go back to Will. Have the life he hadn’t even dared to dream of for the past six years.

End the war.

Nico forged on, following signposts too vague to even name, until finally, he found what he was looking for in a dark cave deep underground.

“Arawn, King of Annwn, I seek thee,” Nico called. He repeated it three times, and then he waited.

An unknown time later, a voice answered him. “Nico, Son of Hades, why do you wake me from my slumbers? The hour is late, and I am weary.”

Arawn’s shadowed form became partially visible in the darkness of the cave. Ancient deities, forgotten ones, had very little energy of their own. The Greek and Roman gods, and even the Egyptian ones, had more because of their influence on Western civilization. Aside from the occasional inclusion in scholarly materials (and being used as a villain by Lloyd Alexander), Arawn had nearly no influence. Mostly, he slept.

Nico bowed respectfully. “I apologize for disturbing your slumber, Lord Arawn. I seek your counsel.”

Another long silence ensued, broken eventually by the voice from the darkness. “What need you, Son of Hades?”

“One has come to my attention who calls himself Pwyll Pen Annwn,” said Nico. “Has your old friend survived all these years?”

“He has not,” said Arawn after yet another long pause. “He died many a year ago. He left behind offspring who bore his image; perchance one of them has taken his name.”

A descendent, then. It made sense. It was also something of a relief not to have to be fighting a millennia-old warrior-king.

“Thank you, my lord.” Nico bowed again. “Forgive my intrusion. I shall not trouble you again.”

Nico expected Arawn to leave, but the King of Annwn remained. It felt like hours before he spoke again.

“Son of Hades, there are rumors.”

“Yes?” said Nico, for lack of anything better presenting itself.

“The rumors say that Cichol seeks to rise again. They say that he has found a vessel in the mortal world. They say that he has the loyalty of some of the Fomor. Have you heard this, Son of Hades?”

“I have not, but . . . it makes sense, given what I have heard.” Nico contemplated the news for a moment. Cichol, the ancient god of the Celtic Underworld, certainly could have been the shadowy figure Paul had been speaking with. What Arawn meant by “vessel,” Nico didn’t know, but it didn’t sound good. Neither did a possible rising of the Fomor. “Thank you again, Lord Arawn. I will leave you to your rest.”

There was a strange, sighing sound, and the dark cave was empty again.

***

Nico missed Will.

The Chase-Jacksons came home around the time Nico finished showering. Dinner was made, days at work and school were discussed, bad jokes were cracked (Percy), intelligent observations were made (Annabeth), and the subject of trains was expounded on (Robbie). Dinner was eaten.

Nico missed Will.

After dinner, Annabeth sat down with Nico, who told her about his conversation with Arawn. She showed him a map of New York with places her contacts had observed some of the people Nico knew were involved in the cult. She was coming close, she thought, to finding where they were keeping their treasures. If Nico could remove those, the group would become far less dangerous. The two of them talked while Percy bathed Robbie. From the amount of splashing going on, Nico imagined Annabeth was quite grateful that Percy’s command of water would ensure a nice, dry bathroom afterward.

Nico missed Will so much . . . 

“I talked to my cousin Magnus today,” Annabeth was saying. “He’s the Norse demigod I told you about. You’d like him, I think. He’s got a dark sense of humor.”

Nico absorbed this. “What did he have to say?”

“He said there was a dustup in the Norse world last year when someone tried to steal Hel’s scepter. It’s supposed to command the armies of the dead in Helheim. Magnus said they foiled the plot, but never caught the person behind it. From your description of Ruth, the daughter of Mercury who was working for Paul, I think it must have been her.”

“Makes sense. Hermes and Mercury both have a connection to the Underworld, after all. It’s possible they can even make it into the Norse Underworld.”

They discussed the matter, Nico bringing up the interesting chase he’d engaged in with a couple of Valkyries the previous year. Norse artifacts were highly prized among the cultists, but they were also heavily guarded by einherjar and Valkyries, who had no compunctions at all about stopping graverobbers with extreme prejudice.

Percy entered the room, having put Robbie to bed. “Norse? Are we talking about Magnus? You’d like him, Nico; he’s a healer, like Will.”

Hearing Will’s name was nearly painful. Nico couldn’t even take amusement in the look Annabeth gave her husband.

Percy seemed to recognize that he’d stuck his foot in it. He didn’t try to apologize – which Nico appreciated, because Percy’s apologies were generally long, rambling affairs that left you feeling terrible for making him feel guilty – but cleared his throat and sat down. “Uh, so, anything new?”

“Not really,” said Nico. “I think I’ll go up to the roof and get friendly with some shadows.”

He threw on his coat and sword belt and left the apartment. As the door closed, he heard Annabeth start chiding Percy about mentioning Will. It made Nico smile just a little, not because Percy was getting scolded (though that could be fun to listen to), but because he knew they both cared about him enough to put effort into making him feel comfortable. At least, as comfortable as he could be here, without Will.

He missed Will. It was his ground state of being.

Nico made his way to the top of the apartment building. This late in the evening, the shadows were long, and he sat in one and closed his eyes.

The problem with being able to see everything was that seeing anything important was still toweringly difficult. Nico had found some shortcuts to locating certain people. All of the cultists were touched by death, and to Nico, every one of those touches was distinctive. Every grief was singular, every near-death experience, every illness.

Mostly, the cultists lived ordinary lives. Nico had spent many a dull hour observing them. Occasionally, though, he picked up on a promising lead.

A woman named Barbara was on the move this evening, and she was agitated. The agitation was obvious to Nico as his consciousness flitted from shadow to shadow. She brushed by the crowded masses on New York City’s sidewalks, paying the passers-by no heed. Finally, she reached her destination: a church. She ducked inside.

When Nico made to follow her, he was rebuffed, gently, but firmly. He couldn’t see the being that pushed him back, but he could feel the strength in it, the impossibility of challenging it.

“Not here, Son of Hades,” it told him.

An angel, then. In spirit, Nico would never get past it. Angels were far too powerful in the spirit world for him to even attempt it.

Nico waited outside the church. Barbara was inside for about a half hour, and when she came out again, she was wiping tears away. She pulled out a cell phone and made a call.

“We need to talk,” she said after greetings were exchanged. “All of us, in person. Yes, I’m serious. I can’t go into it over the phone or in the chat room, but it’s important.” She paused, letting the other person speak. “Well, as many as can make it, anyway. I’ll get you the where and the when, okay? Things are . . . I don’t know what’s going on anymore with Paul, and it’s starting to scare me.”

That sounded very promising, indeed. Nico continued to follow her. It was tricky; New York City was rife with all kinds of spirits, and in shadow form, Nico was both visible and vulnerable to them. He managed to stick with Barbara until she got into a cab. He was about to slip in beside her when a shadow man grabbed him. It was a matter of only about a minute to fight off and banish the malevolent spirit, but that was more than enough for Nico to lose the cab.

He cursed. It was the sort of thing that always happened when he tried to stick to someone’s tail. Shadow men were nuisances, and they were particularly thick around the cultists and their auras of death. In his shadow form, Nico attracted them, too. It made staying in shadow form for very long, especially in highly peopled areas, impractical. For all the power Hades had gifted him with, it had left Nico with unexpected vulnerabilities.

As a shadow, he was, essentially, a spirit, and he had to abide by the same rules as spirits. He had tracked several cultists back to their homes, but he couldn’t pass thresholds. Sunrises were inevitably psychic resets, and if Nico got caught in one, he was thrown back into his body with a monstrous headache. Places with guardian spirits were problematic, to say the least. He could get past some of them, but he had to be very careful. He’d learned the hard way not to fight temple guardians when a Foo dog had taken a chunk out of his incorporeal ass. Talk about an experience he’d prefer never to speak of . . .

Thinking back to the church, Nico was just grateful that angels had specific duties that they never varied from. A mercenary angel was too dreadful to think about, and he’d once run across a Valkyrie merc. She’d been scary enough, but thankfully bound to flesh. Demons were another story, but most of them he’d run across weren’t eager to go up against Hades and were smart enough to realize that attacking his son, who was on a mission directed by Hades, would be a bad idea. The one that hadn’t cared about Nico’s parentage and followed him back to his body had promptly been destroyed by Stygian iron.

Lesser spirits, like shadow men, were simply annoying. They started out “life” as psychic imprints left by particularly evil or disturbed people, a weaker form of a _mania_. Most of the time, any such imprints were wiped away by a rising sun, but those in shielded locations could linger, and they became magnets for dark spiritual forces. Some could get powerful enough to interact with the physical world, but most never did. They spent their existences brawling with whatever spirits got close enough, at least until something banished or dissipated them. Nico, for instance.

Whatever the cause, though, tonight’s hunt was done. The investigation of his latest lead would have to take a different form. What Nico needed was more information about Barbara. And he thought he might know where to get it.

***

Nico shadow-traveled to the street in front of the church. He likely could have traveled directly inside, since angels usually didn’t stop flesh from entering, but he thought he’d be courteous. He paused briefly outside the doors and addressed the invisible guardian.

“I mean no harm to anyone inside.”

With that, he entered. Inside, a few people sat in pews or lit candles in alcoves. It was quiet, peaceful, worshipful. Nico was hit with a powerful sense of déjà vu; he knew he’d been in Catholic churches when he was a little boy, though he couldn’t quite remember.

A priest was looking at him. Nico imagined he stood out. It was as good an opportunity for an introduction as any, so Nico approached.

The priest gave him a benevolent smile. “Can I help you?”

“There was a woman in here a short time ago named Barbara,” Nico said. “I’m trying to prevent her from doing something stupid, and I’d appreciate any help you could give me.”

The benevolent smile faded. “That’s . . . quite a statement. I can’t tell you anything she has said in confession.”

“I can guess.” Nico flashed the priest a brief smile, one that was calculated to disturb people. “She’s told you about things you find very, very difficult to believe. Things about supernatural forces and small-g gods. But she spoke of them with great conviction, enough so that you know she believed her own words. She’s conflicted about her path, and she’s afraid. She wonders if disloyalty would be a lesser sin than continuing on a path that could lead to great suffering for many people. And she told you that the Angel of Death is coming after her.”

“Perhaps . . .” The priest had gone pale. “Perhaps we should discuss this in my office.”

“That sounds like a good idea.”

Nico followed the priest from the beautiful sanctuary down a depressingly mundane hall into a cozy study.

“I’m Father Stephen, by the way. What can I call you?” asked the priest as he ushered Nico into the office.

“My name is Nico.”

“Nico, then. Can I get you something?” Father Stephen asked as soon as the door closed. “Water? Coffee? I have a Keurig.”

Nico shuddered inwardly. He was a proud coffee snob, and in his opinion the Keurig was an abomination. “No, thank you. I don’t expect to be here long.” He sat down in a chair Father Stephen indicated. “Barbara is in great danger. I regret to say I’m part of that danger. I have to stop what she and her friends are doing one way or another. I would prefer not to harm her, but if it comes down to it, I will.”

The priest absorbed this, looking hard at Nico. “You’re the Angel of Death she spoke of, aren’t you?”

Nico nodded. “Not by my own choice. There are greater forces at work here.”

For a long time, priest and demigod stared each other down. Finally, Father Stephen sat back and sighed deeply. “During my training, I was present at a couple of exorcisms. I saw things there that . . . it would be odd to say they made me believe in the supernatural, because you’d think someone studying to be a priest would already believe in it, but there’s a difference between belief and knowing. For me, it’s not a matter of faith to say that spiritual forces are real and powerful. I know they are. I’ve experienced them with my physical senses. Faith, for me, is believing in something even greater. All of this is to say that I believe what Barbara has told me, without getting into the specifics of her confession. And I believe what you’ve told me.”

“What can you tell me?” Nico asked, shifting his mental stance slightly.

“That she has had a hard life. I’ve known Barbara for almost twenty years. I married her to her husband and christened her daughter.” Father Stephen’s eyes were sad. “I also buried both of them after a terrible accident. Barbara’s parents died when she was just a teenager, and the grandparents who took her in followed a few years later. Barbara . . . I believe she sees death as the ultimate enemy, one that has been stalking her for her entire life.”

Nico nodded slowly. “I understand that. Better than you know.”

“I believe you. Without being too specific again, however, I believe she may be . . . open to persuasion to changing her path. She’s in tremendous pain, but she has a good heart, a kind heart. She just needs hope.”

Hope. Not long ago, Nico wouldn’t have understood the key the priest had just handed him. But now he did. He stood up. “Father, you may have just saved more lives than you know. Thank you.”

Father Stephen stood as well, looking a little puzzled, but happy. “You’re very welcome, my son. And you are welcome at my church.”

Nico gave him a cynical little smirk. “I’m a gay pagan.”

Father Stephen gave him a whimsical little smile. “So is my nephew. I’m working on the ‘pagan’ part.”

That actually drew a small chuckle out of Nico. “Thank you again, Father Stephen. I’ll show myself out.”

He left, head swimming with new thoughts.

***

Come morning, Nico consulted with Annabeth.

Annabeth had a mole. She had recruited a descendant of Mercury whom she described as being “as sneaky a bastard as you’d ever hope not to get ripped off by” to make contact with the cultists and worm his way into their confidence. So far, her confidence in him had paid some huge dividends. He’d installed a back door into the cultists’ online presence so Annabeth could keep an eye on them without being seen herself. He had also met up with some cultists in California, from whom he’d learned the cult was keeping the bulk of their artifacts in a storage facility in New York. Thus far, he hadn’t found out which one, but he was working on it.

“If I know Kyle, he’ll have the information for us soon,” Annabeth told Nico. “Don’t ask me how he manages to work things like, ‘Hey, do you know the exact facility where we’re keeping our Underworld treasures? No reason, just asking,’ into a conversation without raising a bunch of red flags, but he does.”

“I actually have a different task for him right now,” said Nico, and he told her about what he’d overheard while tailing Barbara and about the conversation he’d had with Father Stephen the previous night. “I need to strike while the iron is hot. If I could talk to the New York group, I feel like I could persuade them to break from Paul.”

Annabeth raised a skeptical eyebrow. “Or they could kill you.”

“I’m not afraid of that.”

“You’re too casual about your personal safety, Nico.”

Nico shook his head. “No, that’s not it. These people . . . they’re not inherently violent.” He searched for words. “They’re in pain. They’re striking out at death because they think it will ease their pain to vanquish or control death. But it won’t. I can – I can help them.”

Annabeth’s brow furrowed, and she thought about his words for a few minutes. Nico waited in silence.

“I don’t like the thought of you going in alone,” she finally said.

“I know, but think about it.” Nico spread his hands. “They’re going to feel threatened enough already. They’re terrified of me. Having another demigod along could scare them even more. The only one I would even think of asking is Piper, and she’s got a new baby. And . . . it’s only right that I face them alone, with strength on their side. It’s the only way they’ll listen, really listen.”

“I still don’t like it.” Annabeth thought for a moment, then sighed in acceptance. “But I think you are right. I’ll have Kyle feel out what’s happening here. He’s got a couple of contacts with the New York group, and if I know him, he’ll wrangle out the date, time and place they’re meeting in less than twenty-four hours. And you and I, Mr. Dark Side, are going to work out a plan of . . . not attack for the meeting. Capisce?”

Nico smiled. “Capisce.”

***

That afternoon, during a study group, Annabeth received a message from Kyle. She smiled at the contents; Nico would definitely be pleased. She sent a message back, thanking Kyle and giving him several instructions that would definitely not please Nico. And then she sent out some emails that she was fairly certain would make him absolutely furious.

She didn’t care. Nico’s insistence on fighting this war alone had hurt him and his loved ones enough already. It was time to end it, once and for all, and if that meant pissing him off with her methods?

He’s just have to deal.

Happy with her work, Annabeth went back to studying.


	8. Confrontations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nico confronts the cultists and finds out what Annabeth's been up to.

Nico watched from the shadows as people arrived.

Annabeth had given him a message from Kyle that he’d learned the bulk of the New York cultists were to meet at Barbara’s church this evening. So Nico watched as some familiar faces filed into the church where he’d met with Father Stephen the previous evening. After he hadn’t seen any other cultists – at least, none of the ones he was familiar with – for about ten minutes, he withdrew back to his body.

And then he shadow-traveled to the front of the church, nodded to its unseen guardians, and entered. He felt a little naked without his sword, but he’d felt it best to leave it behind this time. If worse came to worse, he could shadow-travel out of there. But somehow, he didn’t believe it would.

He didn’t see Father Stephen about, but that was a good thing, for his purposes. Instead, he found a helpful-looking nun.

“Excuse me, Sister,” he said, doing his best to look harmless while being aware it wasn’t something he was very good at. “I’m with Barbara’s group, and I’m a little late . . .”

The nun, thankfully, bought it. She directed him to a room in the church’s education wing. He thanked her and went in the direction she’d indicated.

When he reached the room, he paused a moment, out of view of the classroom’s window, and listened to the murmur of voices from within. His heart was beating faster than usual, as if he were bracing for a fight.

Nico took a few deep breaths, and then he went in.

***

Things weren’t okay.

It was what kept running through Barbara’s head as she sat at the table with her . . . friends? Fellow believers? What were they to each other, really?

Marie wasn’t sitting. She was pacing a little, arms folded tightly across her body, tense. Barbara guessed she wanted a cigarette.

Gabe sat at the table, absently toying with a bottle of Coke. He looked tired. Barbara knew he kept long hours at work, trying not to think about what had happened to his wife.

Tony’s eyes were red again. Barbara wondered if his husband was in the hospital again.

She looked around the table at the others there, sixteen in total. Kellie, Cole, Laurie. Alex, Hannah, Vic. So many more, and she knew there were other groups like this in the US and Europe. They were all so wounded, and it was what had drawn them to Paul’s promises. Paul had taken over after Carl, the previous leader, had been killed. As charismatic and persuasive as Carl had been, Paul was even moreso. But lately . . .

Lately, the things Paul said were starting to scare Barbara. Talk of “sacrifices” and getting help from somewhere mysterious. There was just something, for lack of a better word, off about the way he acted.

“. . . point is, I have to agree with Barbara: Paul’s not answering questions. He’s giving us all the ‘trust me’ bullshit,” Marie was saying.

“He’s worried about the Angel,” said Tony, trying to placate her. “No one knows how he gets his information. The fewer people who know our plans, the less likely it is that the Angel will find out.”

His words didn’t mollify Marie. “‘Our’ plans? I don’t even know ‘our’ plans! Do you?”

Gabe sighed heavily. “As much as I don’t want to admit it, I think Barbara’s right to be concerned. If we go as a group, we can persuade Paul to level with us.”

The door opened, and a new figure stepped in. “No, you can’t. He’ll lie to you, the way he’s been lying all along.”

A ripple of surprise ran through the room at the appearance of this black-clad man. And though Barbara had never seen him, she knew he was the Angel.

He was beautiful.

His face was fine-boned and pale, his lips contrastingly soft. Shining black hair hung past his shoulders. He was slim and lithe, but his stance was that of a warrior. Save only for the scars on his face, he was flawless; disconcertingly, disarmingly lovely.

Judging by the shocked silence, Barbara wasn’t the only one who realized who he was. She stood, trying not to make any move that could be considered aggressive.

“You’re . . .” she breathed.

A slightly cynical smirk graced the Angel’s face. “Nico di Angelo, Son of Hades. I’d tell you not to be afraid, but that would be pointless. But I’m here to parley.” He peeled away the black aviator jacket he wore and let it drop to the floor, displaying his bare arms. “I’m unarmed, and I swear to you on the River Styx that I will do no harm to anyone here for the duration of this meeting, and I will leave this place peacefully, no matter what the outcome is.”

Utter silence greeted this statement. After it had stretched uncomfortably long, Marie broke it.

“You’re shorter than I thought you’d be,” she said.

Geneva, another of the group, broke into a hysterical-sounding giggle at that. Barbara couldn’t hold it against her, given that the world had just tipped on its side. Again.

Fortunately, the Angel – Nico – didn’t seem offended. He smirked again. “I also swear to you on the River Styx that I will tell you nothing but what I know to be the truth. Enough of you are or have known Greek or Roman demigods that you should understand what that means.”

Barbara had heard from others about the curse of the Styx, but at the moment, her attention was arrested by the tattoos on his arms and poking out of his shirt collar. The rumor that he had a tattoo for every one of his victims was true, then.

“Why should we listen to anything you have to say?” she demanded, suddenly furious. “You’ve killed how many of us, and you have the nerve to come here and say you want to talk? Now?”

Nico’s strange, colorless eyes fixed on her. “I’ve killed forty-three of you in various places around the world. I take no pride in this; I’d have preferred to avoid it, but you gave me no choice. Neither did my father.” He held up a hand to stave off the objections coming at him from around the room. “I won’t go into the harm this little cult has already done and is capable of in the future, unchecked. You either won’t believe me, or you don’t care. I get that.”

Marie wasn’t going to be quelled, though. “You want us to stop? Then tell the Olympians to stay the fuck out of our lives. Isn’t it enough that they keep spawning demigods on us so they can use them for their own purposes? Isn’t it enough that my daughter died thanks to some squabble between the gods? You can tell Hephaestus to go to hell! I served him, and for what? I have nothing left, nothing!”

“I don’t care about the Olympians.” Nico’s voice was quiet. “Be as bitter at them as you want. I certainly have been. That doesn’t matter right now. What matters is that you’re being used. Paul isn’t who you think he is. His goals are not what he has told you. And you’re all in danger. So are the people I love.”

“Are you surprised he’s coming after you, after what you did to his wife?” Gabe asked, his normally soft voice gone hard. “His pregnant wife?”

At that, the Angel froze. Barbara could swear the room grew darker and colder as fury rose in his eyes.

“He told you that I killed Kayla?” Nico asked, his voice even quieter than before. “She was my friend, the sister of the man I love. I never harmed her, ever. That’s the truth, sworn on the Styx.”

The utter conviction in his voice seemed to make the unified anger of the cultists crack into pieces.

Nico sighed, looking down, his anger seeming to fade. “I’ll tell you what I have learned about Kayla’s fate. She left the Greek world to live among mortals. In that time, she met Paul, and it seems they had a whirlwind romance and got married, from what you’ve told me. Sometime after she became pregnant, though, she discovered something about Paul that frightened and horrified her. She ran, and she eventually found an old friend, a cloud nymph named Sela. Kayla gave birth, and she handed her daughter off to Sela and told her to seek one of her brothers. Kayla gave her two options, Austin Lake or Will Solace. She didn’t want to know exactly where her daughter went, and for good reason. Sela followed Kayla’s orders, while Kayla went to confront Paul. I learned this much from Sela.

“Exactly what happened at that confrontation, I don’t know. What I can tell you is that Kayla died, and Paul turned her into a revenant under his command, trapping her between life and death. I saw them in a dream. Paul used Kayla to kill Ruth as well.”

Barbara felt like the wind had been knocked out of her. “Paul said that you killed Ruth.”

“No.” Nico held out his arms. “I don’t deny what I’ve done. I’ve written the story on my skin. Paul blamed me for Kayla’s and Ruth’s deaths, and he lied about his daughter, because he knew you would believe him. Ruth’s death gave him a fresh alarm to raise when I was out of action, recovering from an encounter with rogue hellhounds. Thank you for that, by the way.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Marie asked, sounding like she was on the verge of bashing her way out of the room for a cigarette.

“I mean, your activities have stirred the Underworld up – the whole Underworld, not just the Greek or Roman Underworld, they’re all connected – that I’ve spent far more time over the past six years hunting and putting down stray monsters than I have fighting with your stupid cult.” Nico glared around the room. “I tried to explain this. I warned you, again and again, that your insane attempt to control death will lead instead to suffering for everyone. I’ve begged those of you I’ve come in contact with to listen. Because they haven’t, I’ve had to become your Angel of Death. I never wanted to. I still don’t want to. This is my last-ditch effort to end this without further bloodshed.”

Tony shifted in his seat. “Is this your way of warning us that you’ll slaughter us all if we don’t back down?”

Nico looked at him, and for the first time, Barbara recognized the sorrow etched into the Angel’s face.

“No,” he said after a moment. “There’s no need for me to harm any of you, not anymore. Paul has been the driving force behind your movement since Carl’s death, and he’s been using you for his own agenda. We’ve put it together, some friends and I. Paul is a descendent of the Underworld. I’ve been around his daughter; I’ve sensed the blood in her.” For a moment, his face softened. “She’s a beautiful, healthy child, by the way, being cared for by her uncle. 

“That’s beside the point, though. Paul, I believe, is a descendent of Pwyll Pen Annwn, a figure in Celtic mythology who was appointed a lord of the Underworld by Arawn. It looks like Paul has been in contact with a more ancient deity, Cichol, first king of the Celtic Underworld and lord of the Fomorians. Paul wants to bring Cichol back. Why, I don’t know, but I’d imagine it’s for power. He’s promised his lord Tartarus, which contains all of the most evil monsters out of Ancient Greece. Arawn told me that Cichol has found a vessel . . .”

Nico trailed off, looking like he’d just realized something. “A vessel. A body. Dawn. Paul has promised Cichol his daughter as a means of manifesting in this world. With a blood tie, Paul would have the most influence over him. That’s the endgame. Cichol will rise at Samhain and take possession of the child.”

Unease was growing in the room. Barbara remembered something Paul had said.

“Samhain – Paul said we would perform a ritual at Samhain that would get us the power we need,” she blurted. “Are you sure about this, Angel?”

“I can’t know for certain,” he admitted, “but it fits with what I’ve discovered. About a month ago, _sluagh sidhe_ attacked Camp Half-Blood. Those of you with demigods in your family should know it. Two campers, a fourteen-year-old son of Hephaestus and a fifteen-year-old daughter of Demeter, were killed in the attack. The _sidhe_ were trying to get to Dawn, Paul and Kayla’s daughter.”

Marie had gone white. “A son of Hephaestus?”

“You think Paul had something to do with that?” asked Kellie, who’d also lost a Greek demigod child.

Nico shrugged. “ _Sluagh sidhe_ are cursed spirits from Celtic mythology. I know that Paul has been deeply involved with an ancient Celtic death deity. The spirits came after Paul’s daughter. Let’s just say it seems likely.”

Cole threw up his hands. “Great, so now we’ve supposedly got a choice between an ancient Celtic deity and the Olympians. Guess how much I care? They can all go to hell as far as I’m concerned.”

“There’s no way to bring down the Olympians, not without destroying Western civilization as well,” Nico said. “They’re too ingrained.”

Cole folded his arms, bitterness in his face. “Western civilization isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.”

Barbara felt she had to cut in. “But bringing it down would . . . there’s no way to do it without an unimaginable amount of destruction.”

“Precisely.” Nico’s eyes fixed on her. “And I don’t think most of you have it in you to inflict that kind of suffering. You’ve all been hurt, you all hate death for what it’s taken from you.” He glanced at Tony, who was quietly crying. “Or is taking from you. Believe it or not, I don’t blame you for that. I lost my whole family, my whole world, by the time I was ten. Being the son of Hades hasn’t made my life easier. Not by a long shot. But . . .” He sighed. “There were people, friends, who helped me to let go of my bitterness. I had a life. I found a new family. I fell in love. And then my father called on me because your cult had grown too dangerous.”

He shook his head. “For six years, I followed his orders, alone. I cut myself off from those I love. And for what? Dealing death in a way I never imagined myself doing. As the years went on, I stopped feeling anything. I lost sight of why I was doing it, of why I should try to preserve this world. Being injured brought me back into the fold of the Greeks. They made me see, made me feel again, as much as I didn’t want to. They made me accept their help. And . . . my lover is raising Kayla’s child, a child who deserves a safe world to grow up in. Because of them, I have a reason to want the world to go on.”

Barbara thought about her daughter. “And for those of us who have lost our reason to go on?”

“Defeating death won’t ease your pain, Barbara.” The Angel’s voice had grown soft, compassionate. “Not that you truly can. Even if your cult succeeded in everything it wanted to do, eventually, the universe would present its bill, and it’s one you could never pay. Your sorrow will end one day. All things will, even the Olympians. New life will arise out of the death of the old, creation out of destruction. It’s the way of things. Death isn’t evil. It simply is. For one like you, I know that’s not much comfort. But you do still have those who care about you. I spoke with your priest. He’s a good man. You should let him help you.”

Tony wiped his tears away with his hands. “I’m not going to be able to save my husband, am I?” He looked at Nico. “I was never going to be able to save him.”

Tony’s words appeared to hit Nico the hardest. There was a long silence before he replied.

“Be present with him while you can. Right now, you have him. You have love. That’s more important than anything. There’s never any guarantee of tomorrow, not for any of us.” His face was shadowed and lined with sadness. “Certainly not for me. I have to stop Paul’s plans, or Dawn will never be safe. One way or another, this ends. I don’t think you’ll see me again.”

He picked up his jacket and shrugged it on. “For what it’s worth, I’m sorry for what I’ve done. I won’t ask your forgiveness, but I regret every death and all the pain I’ve caused you.”

Marie gave a snort of disbelief. “And that’s just . . . it?”

“That’s it.” The Angel glanced around the room again. “Find your hope again. Look to what you have now, in the present. There’s more power in connection than in the gods themselves. It took me too long to realize that. You can all help each other with your pain. You’ve lost enough. Perhaps you’ve gained something as well.”

With that, the Angel backed into a shadowed corner and disappeared.

There was a long, shaken silence in his wake. Again, Marie was the one who broke it.

“I need a fucking smoke.”

***

As busy as they were, the streets of New York City were the closest thing to peace Nico could find as he took some time to walk off his agitation after leaving the cultists’ meeting. It had been one of the most stressful things he’d ever done, but he was glad he’d met them, looked them in the eyes, and spoken to them without threats. Ultimately, they were just people, people who had suffered and fallen for the lies of a charismatic leader. He hoped they would take his advice. Isolating himself had caused pain for too many people.

Sometime around midnight, feeling calmer, he shadow-traveled to a quiet storage area. He found, as he’d expected to, two familiar sons of Hermes.

“Hey, Nico. Whassup?” asked Connor Stoll, as if they’d just seen each other yesterday.

“Not much. Are you making progress?” Nico asked, looking at the closed door to one of the storage units.

“Progress made,” said Travis Stoll. He pressed a button on a cobbled-together remote, and the door rolled up. “Thankfully, we had Lou here to keep us from being turned into smudges on the ground.”

Lou Ellen, Nico belatedly realized, was sitting on the ground in the shadow of the unit, looking tired. She waved. “There were some nasty magical traps just waiting to be sprung. Travis thought there might be and called me in.”

Travis pointed into the unit. “Want to take a look?”

Nico hardly needed to; the hairs on the back of his neck were standing up in the presence of the dark energy from all the artifacts inside. A single glance, with his near-perfect night vision, confirmed what he expected to see.

The artifacts came from all over the world, but especially the Western world. The great majority were Greco-Roman, Norse and Christian. And there were a lot of them. Nico noted, though, that there were few or no Celtic items. That fact didn’t bode well for the inevitable confrontation with Paul.

“We need to get these to Hades,” he said.

“Lucky for you, you have a couple of sons of the messenger god on hand,” said Connor. “Lou? You think you’re up to helping? I’ve got . . . an Idea!” He gave an evil laugh.

Nico wasn’t sure about the Stolls having Ideas (evil laugh or no), but he was out of them, so he stood off to the side with Travis as Connor and Lou Ellen drew a large circle and traced Greek writing inside of it.

“How’s life these days?” Travis asked. Nico gave him a Look. Travis remained unruffled. “Connor and I have a YouTube channel. It’s called ‘We Stolled It.’ Our last prank video has over ten million views so far. Dancing with the Stars has asked us both to be on its next season.”

Nico contemplated that. “I hope they have really good insurance.”

Travis laughed. “Yeah, you haven’t changed, di Angelo.”

Nico wanted to argue that, in fact, he had changed hugely, but arguing with a Stoll was almost always an exercise in futility. He settled for a baleful look. “Let’s find out what your little brother is plotting.”

As it turned out, Connor’s plan was uncharacteristically sensible. He and Travis were sons of the messenger god, and Hermes had a connection with the Underworld. So did Hecate, Lou Ellen’s mother.

“I figure if we can invoke our dad and Lou helps you with the shadow magic, we could send this stuff down to the Underworld from here,” he said. “Couldn’t hurt to try, anyway. Well, not much. Probably.”

Having no better plan himself, and not wanting to personally shadow-travel hundreds of potentially-volatile artifacts down to Hades, Nico agreed to try. They placed an experimental bunch of artifacts inside Lou Ellen’s circle. Then the Stoll brothers whipped out a couple of kazoos and played a hymn to their father.

Nico did not even want to know about Hermes’s sense of humor, because the invocation worked. With Hermes’s guidance and Lou Ellen’s help, he opened the shadows and sent the artifacts straight to his father’s palace. Persephone would complain about the mess, but Nico was far beyond caring.

They repeated the process ten times. By the end, Nico was dizzy with exhaustion, and Lou Ellen dropped to the ground and started snoring.

“We’ll take her back to our place and let her crash on the couch,” said Travis. “Wouldn’t be the first time it’s happened. That was when she turned twenty-one and discovered tequila.”

Nico rubbed his eyes. “Thanks, you two. Thank Lou for me when she wakes up, too. Tonight’s events alone set these guys back years.”

“Dude, anytime you need somebody to steal shit, you know where to come,” said Connor cheerfully. “This was fun. We have to keep things legal for our YouTube. Mostly. Well, with plausible deniability, anyway.”

The Stolls certainly hadn’t changed a bit. Nico waved goodbye and shadow-traveled back to the Chase-Jackson apartment.

He nearly fell down as he came out of the shadows. He stumbled and flopped down on the couch, feeling weaker than he had since recovering from the hellhound incident. There was still more he wanted to do before the night was out, but it couldn’t hurt to rest for just a little while . . .

Nico slept.

***

He found himself in Denmark. He recognized the city of Copenhagen from his travels. It was morning there, the sun casting long shadows over the streets. And there was a dead man walking them.

 _Einherji_ , he realized. The man, who looked like he was still in his teens, was one of Odin’s einherjar. He was walking with purpose toward a certain house. Nico’s spirit followed him.

It was odd. Nico had never seen the young-looking man (there was no telling how old he actually was), who looked a bit like Kurt Cobain, with his messy, dirty-blond hair and scruff, but his gray eyes were oddly familiar. So, for that matter, was the sunny aura about him. The morning sun seemed to find him even in the shadows, the same way –

The same way it always did with Will.

Nico pushed the thought aside as the einherji rapped hard on a door. He repeated the action a few times until finally, a sleepy, bathrobe-clad man opened the door.

“Lars Johannesen?” asked the einherji.

“Yes,” said the man, looking guarded. Nico got the feeling Lars had just spoken in Danish, but Nico was perceiving the conversation in English.

The einherji proffered an envelope, which Lars took and opened. He pulled out a piece of stationery with the heading “Hotel Valhalla” and read the letter. Whatever the contents were, they were enough to make him turn sheet white.

“I’ll give you the high points in case you don’t want to read all the legalese Odin insists on,” said the einherji. “One, the guardians of Valhalla know what you and your friends are doing. Two, we’re not fans. Three, if you don’t cut it out, we will make you. I personally am more of a healer than a killer, so I’d prefer to avoid bloodshed, but if you insist . . .” He shrugged.

“Are you . . . are you the Angel?” Lars asked.

“Nope. He’s a friend of my cousin’s, though. She thinks he’s been terribly overworked fighting you people for the past six years, so she called in some favors.” He smirked at the startled man. “I’ve got a lot of deliveries to make today all over Scandinavia, so unless you have further questions, this has been Magnus Chase’s Express Threat Delivery Service, and if for any reason you’re not completely satisfied, you can try complaining to my boss.”

 _Annabeth_ , thought Nico as Magnus walked away from the house. What in all Hades had she done?

As if in answer, he was swept away from the scene and found himself in an expensive-looking house. People, maybe ten or so, were seated in a living room drinking coffee as a concerned-looking young man spoke.

Nico didn’t get to hear any of what the young man was saying, though, because there was a sudden, authoritative rap at the door. A woman about Barbara’s age went to open it.

As soon as she did, Hazel strode in, flanked by the current praetors of the Twelfth Legion. All three were dressed in full Roman armor, purple capes swirling about them. Nico heard the distinctive sound of someone’s coffee cup shattering on the hardwood floor.

“I am Hazel Levesque, daughter of Pluto and former praetor of the Twelfth Legion,” she announced. “These are Margo Tennyson, daughter of Apollo; and Shawn Harold, son of Vulcan, the current praetors. We’re here to deliver a message from my father and the Roman Senate.” She lifted her chin. “This cult is to disband immediately. We know of your activities and the harm you have already caused. Some of you will come under the discipline of the Legion. For those that will not, consider this a warning: If you continue in your efforts to bind death, you will be considered enemies of the state of New Rome, and you will be dealt with as such.”

She raked her golden gaze over the stunned gathering. “For years, my brother, whom you’ve named the Angel of Death, has fought you in the shadows, trying to protect the world against the threat you represent. Now, this war has been dragged into the light. There need be no more deaths. However, if you refuse to listen to reason, if you continue on this destructive path . . . there will be a reckoning. This is your only warning. Heed it.”

There was more, but Nico wasn’t interested in it. Mainly, he was furious. How could Annabeth do this? The war was Nico’s duty, his burden and his alone. This wasn’t a fight against inhuman monsters, but humans, and he had taken every precaution to keep his loved ones from getting involved. This was precisely why he’d stayed away.

And if the fight could be settled like this, what had the last six years been for?

He felt lost. And whenever he felt lost, his thoughts turned to Will.

With no transition, Will was there, with him. They were lying in bed together, and Will was kissing him, deep and slow, his hands running over Nico’s bare skin. Nico sighed into his mouth, pressing up into Will’s body, feeling a shock of pleasure run through his body, feeling the need rising within him, the desire . . .

He knew what was happening, and even though he wanted nothing more than to stay, he couldn’t.

“Will,” he murmured as Will’s lips left his mouth and trailed down his throat. “Will, it’s me.”

“I know.” Will’s voice was low and rough with passion.

“No, I mean . . .” It was hard to think when Will was nibbling on his neck. “Will, I’m here. In your dream. This is a dream. It just feels . . . really, really real.”

Will paused and lifted his head. “Nico?”

Nico stroked his face. “This is your dream. Somehow, you pulled me into it. How?”

“I-I don’t know. I feel you all the time, though. I don’t know why I do. You’re not normally asleep when I am.”

Will felt him? And knew his sleep schedule? Nico had avoided being asleep when Will would be for, among other things, just this reason. He didn’t want the temptation of dreaming with Will.

“I had an exhausting evening,” said Nico with a dry laugh at his own understatement.

“Mm.” Will kissed him again, soft and loving. “Whatever the reason, I’m glad you’re here. I’ve missed you so much, Nico.”

“I’ve missed you, too.” And it was tempting, so tempting, to stay, to enjoy this dream with Will. To make love to him again, even in a dream. It took all of Nico’s effort to pull himself away. “I can’t stay. Things are coming to a head. Soon, this will all be over.”

Will caught hold of him. “Come back to me. Whatever happens, come back to me . . .”

Something was tugging at Nico, pulling him back into the slipstream of dreams. Will’s voice faded, and Nico found himself in an upscale hotel room.

“Hello, Nico di Angelo, son of Hades,” said the man known as Paul, or Pwyll Pen Annwn. “It’s about time we talked.”

Nico looked around. Nearby, Kayla’s revenant form stood, unmoving. And there was a shadowed form behind Paul, one Nico recognized from his previous dreams. This time, Cichol seemed more solid, more real.

“You’ve done a good job of hiding from me,” Nico remarked. “I normally don’t have any trouble finding someone in the shadows, or in dreams. But you’re far from normal, aren’t you, Pwyll?”

Paul gave him a humorless smile. “Pwyll Pen Annwn was my ancestor. Some of his gifts have been passed down through the centuries. They were particularly strong in me.”

“Which is why Shady over there glommed onto you?”

“He chose me.” Paul looked over at the ancient god. “He found me when I was a young man, taught me how to use the abilities my ancestor left me. Gave me gifts.” Paul reached out and stroked his fingers over a sheathed sword that radiated power. “Fragarach, the Answerer, once the sword of Manannan Mac Lir. It can cut through any shield or armor, and any wounds inflicted by it are inevitably fatal.”

That couldn’t ever be mistaken for a threat. “And the cultists?”

“Useful fools.” Paul glared at Nico. “At least, they were. My phone has absolutely been blowing up for the past few hours.”

Nico shook his head, fury growing within him. “You took advantage of their pain to pull them into your schemes. That was bad enough.” He glanced over at Kayla. “But what you did to Kayla, what you’re planning to do to your daughter-”

“It’s an honor!” Paul snapped. “My child will be the vessel for Cichol’s return. He will have flesh again, be worshiped again, and I will rule at his side.”

“You will never see your daughter. You will never touch your daughter. For what you’ve done to her mother, my friend, my love’s sister, I will kill you.”

“Do you think you’re morally superior to me, Angel?”

“No.” Nico gave him a fierce smile. “Not even a little.”

For a moment, Paul was silent. Then he laughed. “It’s too bad we’re on opposite sides, Angel. I could’ve enjoyed you as an ally.”

“And I think you’re a douche. Shall we have this out?”

“Why not?” Suddenly, the hotel room vanished, and they were standing on a rocky beach. “Do you recognize this place?”

Nico realized he did. It was an isolated piece of shore well north of New York City. He’d been there a time or two, mostly helping to bring in new campers or, in one case, assisting Percy with a nasty sea beast.

“I’ll be here at dawn,” said Paul. “You want to kill me? You’ll have your chance.”

***

Nico woke with a start. According to the clock, it was about half past two AM. That gave him a couple of hours to plan and to finish this the way he’d started it – alone.

***

In California, Will woke with a start. He glanced at the clock, calculated the time it was in New York.

Then he ran to find Reyna.


	9. A Father's Choice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things finally come to a head, and choices are made.

In the Underworld, Nico put on his Stygian armor. He hadn’t worn it in years, but it always fit him perfectly.

He hadn’t survived this long in a war by being stupid; he knew Paul was going to spring a trap on him. There was no doubt Kayla would be there with orders to kill him, so Nico chose a helmet that would shield his face. And, since Paul had to know Nico would be expecting Kayla, Nico was expecting Paul would have more surprises.

He strapped on his sword belt with its two daggers last. This was it. One way or another the war would end.

Nico indulged in one last thought of Will. If all went well, he would see Will today. If not . . . he hoped Will would find the love he deserved.

Time to go.

***

When Nico appeared on a bluff overlooking the rocky beach, there was a crowd waiting. Around fifty revenants stood, unmoving in the pre-dawn light, around Paul and Kayla.

Seeing her in the flesh was even worse than seeing her in dreams had been. Paul had evidently reanimated her just after her death; she showed no signs of decay, which some of the others did. Nonetheless, the bright spark that had animated the girl Nico had known was gone. All that was left was a shell, a mockery of life. Nico found it repugnant in every way.

The other revenants . . . most of them were familiar. Paul had evidently been playing clean-up after Nico. The bodies of nearly forty of Nico’s victims, as well as Ruth, stared sightlessly at him. Nico didn’t know who the others were. The one thing that they all, without an exception, were, was armed.

It didn’t worry Nico very much. Revenants could fight on the orders of their masters, but they could only follow the patterns they’d learned in life. They couldn’t improvise the way Nico could. Besides, Nico had already fought and defeated the best of them. Pragmatic as he generally was in his killings, he had still allowed the cultists to defend themselves if they so chose. His armor would protect him; it sapped the energy of even Imperial gold or Celestial bronze. Basically, the only change the crowd made in Nico’s plan was that he wouldn’t be able to free Kayla personally. Killing Paul would free all of the revenants, though.

“I didn’t realize you’d bring all your friends,” Nico remarked. “I’m glad I dressed up for the occasion.” He began to move, finding a path down from the bluff, deciding on the best path of attack.

“You don’t know the half of it, Angel,” said Paul. At his words, strange creatures began to emerge from the ocean. No two of them looked alike. Most of them were fairly small, but one or two were eight feet tall or so. Some had the heads of goats, others had only one eye, one arm and one leg. Some looked like human-amphibian hybrids. 

Fomorians, Nico realized. Cichol had once been their leader, before Manannan. Now, Paul had Cichol’s authority and – yes, he was wearing it – Manannan’s sword, Fragarach. The creatures were at his beck and call, and though there were only about half as many of them, they were deadlier than the entire crowd of revenants.

In other words, this was now basically going to be a suicide attack, unless Nico got very, very lucky. It was something he was okay with, actually, and was how he’d rather been expecting this to end. Except . . .

His only worry was what his death might do to Will. The empathic link between them would be severed the moment Nico died, and Will would feel it as a kind of spiritual amputation. But with Paul having gathered this force, being as dangerous as he was, there was no alternative but to take him out now. Nico could only hope the healers in New Rome would be able to help Will.

_I’m sorry, love. I’m glad I got to see you one last time._

“Let’s get this over with, Pwyll,” said Nico.

Paul smiled and drew Fragarach. “The Angel of Death charges into battle one last time. Alone, as always.”

“Not exactly.”

Nico whipped around at the voice, the one he thought he’d never hear again. Standing on the bluff behind him was Will, in full Greek armor and holding his bow.

“Will?” Nico squinted through the visor of his helmet, as if it were deceiving him somehow. “What are you doing here?”

“Protecting the man I love.” Will stared him down defiantly. “That would be you, you idiot.”

Nico nearly choked. Will wasn’t a warrior; he never had been. This was no place for him. “Will, get away from here. I can’t protect you and do what I need to at the same time!”

Paul laughed. “Well, this is a fun twist!”

“How in Hades did you even find this place?” Nico still couldn’t believe his eyes.

“The empathic link I have with you,” said Will. “I saw your meeting with this guy. Neither of you noticed that I tagged along on that dream. And I saw more.” Will glared at Paul, his eyes flicking to Kayla. “You killed my sister.”

“I didn’t want to.” For the first time, Paul betrayed some agitation. “I tried to talk sense into her, but she wouldn’t have it. And considering that you’ve stolen my daughter from me . . .”

“You’ll never see her,” Will declared. “Right now, she’s being looked after by a couple of the most formidable women I know. If you manage to win today, they’ll still keep her safe from you.”

Nico had noticed something: The moment they started discussing Dawn, there was a change in Kayla’s bearing, like someone stirring in their sleep.

“ _If_ I win?” Paul asked incredulously. “Have you not noticed the army I have on my side?”

Will grinned. It wasn’t one of his normal, nice-guy grins. “I thought you might have brought friends, so you know what? I brought some of my own.”

And just like that, Mist dropped away. Hazel and Frank, in full Roman armor, stood on the bluff beside Will. Guido dropped out of the sky, Reyna on his back, Athena’s aegis swirling around her. On a higher bluff to Nico’s right was Jason. Percy walked out of the misty sea air along the beach, Riptide in his hand. From the opposite direction, a red chariot drawn by metal horses drew up the beach carrying Brighid Mortensen, blue swirls painted on her face, with three of her brothers flanking her.

“You didn’t think we’d let ourselves be left out of this, did you, di Angelo?” she called.

And then Festus swooped out of the air, breathing fire.

“Nico!” Leo shouted from his back. “Welcome back, _amigo_!”

His friends were here. They’d come for him in spite of everything he’d done, in spite of the way he’d walked away from them years ago. They were here to fight with him, for him. Nico had no idea how they’d gotten her, or why they’d decided to come, but they were here.

Distantly, he noted the absences of Annabeth and Piper. They both had babies, and from what Will had said, they were likely watching Dawn as well. She was safe. Much safer than Paul would be if he tried to take her.

Paul wasn’t looking so smug now. True, the opposing force wasn’t a large one, but they were some of the most powerful demigods who’d ever lived, legends in their own lifetimes. And Festus was his own cohort.

Nico was starting to believe he had a chance of surviving the morning. “Let’s do this!”

The revenants and Fomor began to advance. Kayla raised her bow.

“Frank, Leo, you’re with Percy. Keep the Fomorians at bay,” ordered Reyna. “Jason, mind the archers. Nico, how can the revenants be killed?”

“They can’t, except with my sword. Beheading is the most efficient way to cripple them, but we have to take out Paul to end their reanimation.”

That was all he could say before the battle was joined. Brighid let out a scream that was half banshee, half berserker, and the chariot charged the main mass of revenants. Jason captured a couple of _venti_ and sicced them on Kayla and a few other archers among the revenants, making their bows useless. They staggered, unable to compensate for the shifting winds. Will began unleashing arrows of his own into the revenants, targeting their heads or weapon hands.

Frank turned into a green dragon and leaped into the surf, tearing his way through the Fomorians as Percy used the water itself to keep them from joining the force of undead. Festus swept by overhead again, and Calypso leaped down to the bluff. She had a staff in her hand and pointed it toward the fracas.

“I have the _anemoi_ , Jason! Go!” she shouted over the din. Jason nodded at her and rode the winds down to the battle.

There was a steam explosion as Festus reached the water. Frank’s dragon form shrugged off the flames and Percy protected himself with a wall of water, but the Fomorians weren’t so lucky. They screamed as flame and steam scorched them.

Nico entered the fray, slashing revenants with his Stygian sword. While those cut down by other weapons continued to move in whatever way they could, Nico’s sword cut through the spells holding some kind of life in their bodies.

Reyna was suddenly by his side, wielding her gladius with her typical precision and grace. “I owe you a slap, _hermanito_ ,” she said almost casually.

Nico almost laughed. “Figured you might, but can we take a rain check?”

“Well, we are a little busy at the moment.”

Nico pressed forward. He heard the ground heave and saw the revenants off to his left stumbling and falling, and he knew it was Hazel’s work. More interesting sounds arose from the surf. Nico couldn’t see him, but knew that Paul was somewhere in the middle of everything, ready to unleash that deadly sword. And there were gusts of wind from ahead.

It changed Nico’s thinking. He headed for the winds. Paul would probably be keeping Kayla close, and the _venti_ gave an indication of where she might be. That was what Nico expected, but when he cut down the last revenant between himself and Kayla, Paul was nowhere to be seen. They’d been separated in the battle.

She had been his friend, Will’s little sister whom he’d loved and protected. For the first time in six years, Nico hesitated to kill. On impulse, he leaped forward, braving the _ventus_ harrying her, and grabbed her shoulder.

“Kayla.” He spoke her name forcefully, putting his power into it. “Kayla, Dawn is safe. She’s loved. Will is raising her. Right now, Piper and Annabeth are protecting her. You did the right thing; you saved her.”

Kayla’s eyes focused on him, and her face softened a little, making her look almost alive again.

“Rest now,” Nico told her. “Rest, and be whole.”

With those words, the tie that bound Kayla’s life to her undead flesh dissolved. She dropped to the ground, finally at peace.

“Kayla! No!”

Paul. Nico had all but forgotten about him as he set Kayla to rest. He turned to confront Paul –

He tried to, at least, but an icicle had stabbed him, and he couldn’t. Nico looked down and saw a sword blade protruding from the front of his armor. It occurred to him that Fragarach could cut through any armor.

Things suddenly seemed very distant.

Paul ripped Fragarach back out of Nico’s body and hissed, “Go to hell,” as he readied another blow.

“NO!” The scream sounded both distant and very close, almost as if it came from inside Nico’s head. Paul suddenly stiffened and choked. Nico finally managed to turn.

A steel-headed arrow protruded from Paul’s throat. In the distance, over his shoulder, Nico saw Will lowering his bow, horror in his face.

The wound from Fragarach was fatal. Nico could feel it sapping his life. But before he went, he had one last duty. One such as Paul, having made a deal with an Underworld god, could be dangerous even after death if allowed to join his master. Nico could stop that.

He grabbed Paul as life ebbed from the man. “Go to Hades,” Nico said, putting the last of his power into those words.

Paul fell. Nico fell.

Nico was dimly aware of surprise and chaos around him. He knew that without Paul, all of the revenants would be freed from their undead bodies. There was some kind of ferocious noise near the water. And then there were running feet and voices calling his name.

“Nico! Nico!” The voice was Will’s, and a moment later, his lover’s face hovered over Nico’s. “Oh, gods, Nico.” Will fumbled with his med kit and pushed a piece of ambrosia between Nico’s lips. “You’re going to be all right. You have to be all right.”

More voices and footsteps. Reyna was suddenly in view, and then Hazel was there, throwing aside her helmet and sword.

“Nico, stay with us, please, stay with us,” his little sister begged. She pulled his helmet off.

“Help me with his armor,” Will said, and he and Reyna began to remove his greaves and breastplate. 

It hurt, and badly, but Nico didn’t care. There was Jason, and Frank, and Percy, and Leo. Calypso, too, though Nico hadn’t known her well. It was a better death than he deserved, to be surrounded by his friends.

Will ripped Nico’s shirt away from his wound and poured powdered unicorn horn into it. “You’ll be fine. I can fix this. It’s a simple wound. You’ll be fine.”

Nico interrupted his litany, voice weak. “Will. Will. His sword is magical. Wounds from it are fatal. It’s okay.”

“No. No, godsdammit! It’s not okay, Nico!” Will leaned over him, took Nico’s face in his hands. “We’re going to have a life together. You swore it. You and me and Dawn. We’ll live at Camp Half-Blood in my cottage. You’ll teach swordplay to campers. You promised me, Nico, we . . .” Tears ran down Will’s face. “We’re bound, you and I. I can heal this.” He pressed a hand to Nico’s wound and began to sing.

Blackness was encroaching on Nico’s vision. He reached for Hazel, and her small, warm hands wrapped around one of his. “I love you. Love . . .”

And it was over.

***

Nico opened his eyes to find himself on the shore of the River Styx, and he was annoyed. “Peace at last,” eh? How was he supposed to find peace when he didn’t know how his death would affect Will?

A figure appeared in the gloom. Charon poled his ferry to the shore. “Hey, Nico, how’s-”

“Don’t,” Nico growled, and he boarded the ferry. “Just drive, okay?”

Charon, not wanting to make himself a target of Nico’s foul mood, obeyed. He ferried Nico down the Styx in silence, coming ashore at the Judgement Pavilion. Nico hopped off before it even landed.

“Nico di Angelo,” one of the judges intoned.

Nico gave them the finger as he passed. It didn’t matter what they thought of his life, and he had no patience for the formality. He kept walking, finding a path only he could see, and soon, the gates of his father’s palace came into view. They opened for him, and Nico walked right in.

He was ready to unload on his father, but to his surprise, Hades had a guest. Nico came to a sudden halt when he realized who the guest was.

“Kayla?”

Kayla Knowles, radiant in a white chiton, looking more alive than ever, smiled at him. “Nico. It’s good to see you.”

She came forward and hugged him. Nico, taken by surprise, hugged her back. “Kayla . . . how are you here?”

“She insisted.” Hades’s voice boomed through the entrance hall of his palace. “I suppose I, too, have difficulty saying no to the children of Apollo. And . . . I thought you might perhaps like to see her.”

Nico pulled back from the hug and looked at Kayla, and he was glad Hades had allowed this meeting. “It’s good to see you, too. It’s really good to see you.”

“Thank you for freeing me.” Her eyes filled with tears. “My baby?”

“Beautiful. Healthy. Happy. And completely unafraid of me.” Nico smiled at Kayla. “Like her mother.”

Kayla grinned and tugged on a lock of his hair. “You never fooled me, not for a second.”

“Daughter of Apollo, I can allow no more time,” said Hades.

Kayla glanced at Hades regretfully and then hugged Nico one more time. “Tell my brother I love him,” she whispered. “And I’m so happy that he’s the one raising my daughter.”

Nico realized she didn’t realize he was dead. He supposed it was because his presence was stronger in the Underworld than the usual shades. But he said nothing, just hugged her back. There was no need to tell her he couldn’t fulfill her request, not here, not now.

Thanatos emerged from the shadows, and he escorted Kayla away. Nico was left alone with his father.

“So,” said Hades. “It’s done.”

Nico nodded wearily. “It’s done. The cult is broken, and Paul’s dead.”

“Indeed.” A dark fire burned in Hades’s eyes. “Thank you for sending him to me. I’ve put him somewhere . . . safe.”

Nico shivered. His father was not known for his mercy. Only justice.

“Well, it’s over, anyway. I think I’ll go to my room now.” _And sulk for the next few hundred years_ , he added silently as he turned to go.

“Not just yet.” Hades’s voice stopped Nico’s movement. “It is not yet time for you to rest.”

Nico turned slowly, anger rising within him. “What do you mean? I did everything, _everything_ you asked me to do!”

“You did, and at great cost to yourself. I have no complaints about the way you discharged your duty.”

“So why can’t I rest now? Six years, Father, six years I chased down this cult, doing things I never wanted to. Six years I spent away from everyone I love.” Nico cut himself short. “Wasted time. In the end, it took all of them to end this. You should have complaints about the way I worked, you really should.”

“But I do not. You did as I asked, and you tried to protect your loved ones as best you could. I hold none of your errors against you, my son.”

Nico looked at him, heart aching at his father’s praise. “Then why can’t I rest? Do you have more for me to do?”

“Not I. There is another with a greater claim to your life now.” Hades gestured, and that was when Nico heard it.

Will was singing.

“Will,” Nico breathed. “Father, what will my death do to him?”

“The two of you are bound. He has chosen to try to heal you, and because of that, if you do not go to him . . .” Hades shrugged. “He must come to you.”

“No.” Nico was horrified. “No, Father, please, don’t let him. He has a child now, he can’t!”

“I can do nothing to stop him. You, however, can. Reclaim your life, my son. Return to him.”

What was Hades saying? Nico’s mind spun, and the only thing it could come up with was, “But wounds from Fragarach are always fatal.”

“And I am Lord of the Dead.” Hades reached out and touched Nico’s wounded side, the first time he’d ever touched Nico. When he pulled his hand back, it was drawing shadows from Nico’s soul. “I release you from my service, Nico, my son. I take from you the shadows I burdened you with, and I take upon myself all responsibility for your actions in this war. Go to your lover. Live by his side. Be happy. You have my blessing.”

Nico looked at his father as if seeing him for the first time. “Father. Thank you. Thank you.”

He closed his eyes and let Will sing him home.


	10. Peace at Last

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nico and Will recover; Festus makes a friend; and Hazel has some good news.

_“Nico’s back! He’s alive!”_

_“Will? Whoa, buddy, you okay?”_

_“His hands are freezing. Will? Will, talk to me.”_

_“Nico, can you hear me? He’s breathing, but just barely.”_

_“We need to get them to Camp Half-Blood now. Leo!”_

The voices faded, and for a time, Nico drifted in scattered dreams and memories.

And then he awoke, opening his eyes to the sight of a healer’s face. Unfortunately, it wasn’t the face he wanted to see.

“Will,” he rasped through a dry throat, and he tried to sit up.

“Don’t move,” Marko ordered, the words “you idiot” clearly implied by his tone, as he placed a hand firmly on Nico’s chest in a move he must have learned from Will.

He needn’t have bothered. Nico found himself too weak to move at all, and there was a fierce pain in his side. He recalled that he’d been run through with a magical sword and temporarily died. That would explain it.

Marko sighed and fetched a bottle of unicorn draught with a straw in it. He lifted Nico’s head a little and said, “Drink up.”

Nico did as he was told, primarily because he was terribly thirsty, and even the chalky, slightly-metallic taste of unicorn draught was welcome. As soon as he was done drinking, Marko pushed a piece of ambrosia into his mouth. It tasted much better, like McDonald’s fries, the way it always had for him.

“Where’s Will?” Nico asked as soon as he could.

“Right over there,” said Marko, nodding toward something off to Nico’s right.

Nico followed his gaze. On a second bed on the other side of the room was Will, apparently asleep. He looked unusually pale to Nico’s eyes. “Is he . . . is he okay?”

“He’s fine.” Marko shook his head in fond exasperation. “He seriously overextended his powers, but he’s still better off than you are. He was up and interfering in your care less than an hour ago. Wore himself out and crashed.”

Nico breathed a long sigh of relief. Knowing Will was all right was all that mattered to him.

Marko’s face softened a little. “You’ve been out for close to three days. Leo used Festus as a medevac to get you two here. Will’s been awake on and off, but he’ll be recovering for a while. Your wound is healing slowly; Will closed it, which kept you from bleeding out, but we had to reopen it to remove some fragments of Stygian iron. They must’ve got there from where the sword pierced your armor. Your sister said you actually died for a little while.”

“I did,” said Nico. “My father . . . he let me come back.”

“Well, try not to get into any more battles for now. You need to rest and heal.” Marko stood up as if to leave, but hesitated. “Um, also . . . look at your arms.”

Nico looked. His arms were still hard with muscle and scarred – 

But his tattoos were gone.

“There’s one left,” Marko said, following his thoughts. “It’s the sun tattoo on your chest.”

***

Nico was able to get up the following day, but it took several more days for him to be able to walk any farther than the ensuite. Will, meanwhile, got used to getting his hands slapped by Marko.

“But I just wanted to-”

“You’ve done enough. You nearly killed yourself bringing him back, remember?”

“But I could-”

“You were severely hypothermic when Leo brought you in, and that was after twenty minutes on a heated dragon’s back. You’re still a little low for an Apollo kid.”

“That doesn’t mean I can’t-”

“No, you’re not giving him any more of your energy. We’ve got this under control. Go to bed, doctor’s orders!”

Will had to admit he’d underestimated his young brother. Marko had not only run the infirmary during Will’s time in New Rome, he’d handled it perfectly when Festus landed at Camp Half-Blood with two nearly-dead men on his back. It was enough to make Will start feeling a little superfluous.

He pondered it a little as he lay in the dappled sunlight under a tree near the canoe lake, Nico sprawled half on top of him, asleep. They’d taken a walk together in the crisp autumn air and then settled down for an afternoon nap. Fortunately, in the magically-sheltered valley, it wasn’t as cold as October in New York should be. Nonetheless, Will was wearing a sweater, and Nico, normally not one to acknowledge the weather, had agreed to wear a warm flannel over his usual black shirt. His favorite jacket was still in the Underworld, and he wasn’t allowed to fetch it just yet.

Unusually for Nico, he was completely unarmed. His sword was in the Hades cabin, and he’d given up his daggers. The Celestial bronze one was in the Camp Half-Blood armory, but he’d given the steel one to Percy with orders to throw it into the ocean.

As for Fragarach, Paul’s sword, it was deemed too dangerous to keep even at Camp Half-Blood. It had been sent to New Rome, where it was locked safely away.

Will felt a ripple in Nico’s emotions, one that concerned Will. He was having a nightmare. Will wrapped his arms around his love, running one hand up into Nico’s inky hair.

“I’m here,” Will murmured into Nico’s ear, and he began to hum. Since the battle, since being released from his duties, Nico had begun to suffer terrible nightmares. Painful as they were, Will took them as a good sign. Nico’s mind was actually dealing with his trauma now rather than shutting it down. Will had discovered that singing brought Nico out of it more easily than anything else.

In a few moments, Nico awoke, his hand suddenly fisting in Will’s sweater. Will held him more tightly, and after a few minutes, Nico relaxed.

“You back with me?” Will asked.

Nico lifted his head a little to look at his boyfriend. “Always.”

Will reached down and fetched the bottle of Gatorade they’d brought along and handed it to Nico, who drank from it. When he was finished, he set it down, and then he stretched up a little and kissed Will on the mouth. Will kissed back, basking in Nico’s presence, his affection. In spite of Nico’s physical and emotional pain, it was so much easier for Will to deal with their empathic link when they were together. Nico’s presence soothed him, and he knew his own presence soothed Nico.

After a few kisses, Nico pulled back, his fingers toying with a lock of Will’s hair, and regarded him with a penetrating look. “How are you doing?” he eventually asked.

Will knew what he was asking. For the first time in his life, Will had killed someone. A mortal. The moment kept replaying itself in his head. The chaos of the battle, losing sight of Nico in the fray, the sudden, horrible knowledge that Nico had been terribly wounded, seeing Paul ready another blow . . . and letting his arrow fly. There had been no choice made in that moment; Will had reacted instinctively to the threat to his mate.

Will didn’t relish the memory, but neither did he regret it. That in itself gave him pause. Will had always been a healer, always pulled people out of battles to help them. He’d done his share of killing monsters, like all demigods, but he’d never knowingly done harm to a person. Not until now. And yet, what could he have done?

“I’m okay, I think,” Will finally said. “It’s something I’ll have to live with, anyway.”

Nico touched Will’s face. “I never wanted you to have to live with it. Not any of you.” He shook his head. “But I wonder how many deaths could’ve been prevented if I had brought my friends in from the beginning.”

“You can’t change the past. No one can.” Will hoped he could convince Nico not to blame himself for the way he’d understood Hades’s orders. Hades was the most isolated and singular of the Olympians, and Nico was more like his father than he’d like to admit. Nico had spent years alone as a child, able to count only on himself. Of course he’d tried to tackle the cult on his own.

It was to Nico’s credit that he’d tried to protect the ones he loved from what he’d had to do. But it was going to be a long journey for him. Will caught his hand as Nico scratched at his wrist again, as if feeling the phantom pain of a vanished tattoo. “Nico, don’t. Your father didn’t want you to blame yourself.”

“They’re still dead. I still killed them.” Nico looked away. “How am I supposed to let Hades take responsibility for that? I can’t.”

“That’s because you’re a good person, no matter what you think,” said Will. “You’ll find a way to deal with it. I’ll help you. We all will.”

Nico studied him again for a long moment. “You were right; we’re bound together.” He shook his head. “I don’t want you to regret that, but I don’t understand how you couldn’t.”

“Well, I don’t. And I won’t. On some level, I chose this, Nico. You’re my other half. You always have been.” Will ran a hand through Nico’s hair. “That said . . . don’t take this the wrong way, but I’ve been thinking that maybe we should back off our physical relationship for a while, and not just while you heal.”

Nico’s brow crinkled. “What do you mean?”

Will took a deep breath, hoping he could put this the right way. “When . . . when we made love for the first time, we both knew you’d get sucked back into the war. There was a time pressure there. We knew we only had a certain amount of time together. But now, we have more. We have a whole future ahead of us, and I want us to have a good foundation for it.” He stroked his thumb along Nico’s cheekbone. “There’s a lot we have to deal with, individually and together. I worry that we could paper over the cracks with sex, and . . . I want more for us.”

Nico looked down for a moment and sighed. “I want to argue with you, but I-I think you’re right. To be honest, I didn’t think I’d live long. I just wanted to be with you, to have that experience . . .” He trailed off, blushing a little. Will couldn’t help but smile. “And I’m glad we did. You made me feel loved. Like I was worth more than I’d believed I was. It helped me to be human again, and I don’t think I’d have been able to speak to the cultists without that.”

“I’m glad, too.” Will pulled Nico’s face closer and kissed him.

Nico kissed him back, long and tender. His eyes were hazy when the kiss ended. “I still want you, but I think you’re right. We kind of did things back end first.”

Will couldn’t have stopped himself for all the riches of Hades. “That’s what _he_ said.”

“Oh, gods, Will,” Nico moaned. “You really just said that, didn’t you?”

Will started laughing almost too hard to answer. “I’m sorry, I’m really sorry, that was horrible of me.”

“It was, it really was.” Nico laughed and then coughed. “And don’t make me laugh. It hurts.”

Will ran his hand down to Nico’s wound. His healer’s senses told him it was healing, but slowly. Nico would have two new scars. But he was alive, and that was important. “Sorry about that.”

“Sure, right, whatever.” Nico toyed with Will’s camp necklace for a moment. “So, no sex for how long?”

“A few months, maybe. I think we’ll know when the time is right.”

“Yeah, I can see that.” Nico nestled into his chest, making a contented noise. “This is okay, though, isn’t it?”

“Yeah.” Will held him closer. “Yeah, this is good.”

***

There was another stop they needed to make before the day was out, and Nico knew it wasn’t one Will was looking forward to. After the battle, Brighid had brought Kayla’s body back to Camp Half-Blood in the chariot. The girls of the Apollo cabin had washed and prepared it, and they’d laid it out in the Hades cabin.

As Will and Nico entered, the Hades cabin was meat-locker cold. Nico knew the temperature was part of the cabin’s magic; it would preserve Kayla’s body until her funeral rites could be completed.

Will, uncharacteristically, didn’t seem to notice the temperature. He knelt down beside the low dais where Kayla’s body lay and uncovered her face.

Nico pulled a blanket off of his bed and knelt, carefully, by Will’s side, draping the blanket over both of them.

“It’s not right,” Will whispered. “Seeing her like this – it’s not right.”

“I know,” said Nico.

Will gasped out a sudden sob. “Kayla. Oh, gods, Nico, she’s really gone.”

And Nico held him as he wept.

***

The following morning, Nico conducted Kayla’s funeral rites. Some of the siblings Kayla had spent her teen years with returned for the occasion. As the pyre burned, Austin stood and played a song he’d written for her. The sweet, golden tones of his sax rose from the amphitheater and lingered over the camp.

Will sat in the front row, holding Dawn in his lap. She played with her favorite stuffed duck through most of the funeral, but Will wanted her to know, later in her life, that she’d been there.

“She’ll know all about her mother,” he told Nico as he sat down beside them. “She’ll know Kayla protected her to her last breath.”

“And beyond,” Nico added.

Will nodded. “And beyond.” He brushed a tear away. “I’m so glad she got to speak to you in Hades, Nico. She deserved so much better than what Paul did to her.”

Nico stroked his back soothingly. “She’s in Elysium now, and she knows you’re raising her child. That made her happy.”

After the funeral, the three went back to the cottage for a nap. For some reason, Nico felt better, both physically and emotionally, after doing the rites. When he awoke after napping, he felt like some of his old energy had finally come back.

He and Will took Dawn down to the campground, where they found Leo holding court with several of his younger siblings, Calypso sitting proudly beside him and Festus taking up half the quad. When Will set Dawn down, she made a beeline for the dragon and started climbing on him.

Festus looked at Leo. _Creak?_

Leo laughed. “Dunno, buddy, just don’t fly off with her, okay?”

“That girl is fearless,” said Will, sitting down. “Unfortunately, as she’s become more mobile, she’s getting to be more and more of a terror to her parental figures.”

Nico sat next to Will. “Thanks for showing up, Leo. How on earth did you find out what was happening and get there, though?”

Leo had filled out a little, but otherwise looked almost exactly like he had as a teen. Same messy hair, same elfin face, same expression that made you subtly look for the nearest fire extinguisher and first-aid kit. Calypso, on the other hand, definitely looked older. She looked like a young woman now rather than a fifteen-year-old girl. Nico wondered how she felt when she looked in the mirror.

“Well, not to give away any trade secrets, but when I got Hazel’s Iris-message, Calypso and I took a, uh, shortcut we’ve found in our travels,” said Leo. 

“The Labyrinth?” Nico guessed.

“There’s more than the Labyrinth out there, _mi amigo_ , and some of it’s scary shit. My lady keeps us safe, though.” Leo smiled affectionately at Calypso.

Nico looked at her. “What’s with the wizard’s staff?”

She gave him an enigmatic smile. “Let’s just say I’ve found my magic again. All it needs are the correct foci.”

“Where have you guys been all this time?” Will asked, wrapping an arm around Nico’s waist.

“All over, man, all over,” said Leo. “We travel until we find a place we like, we settle down and do something – and a guy who’s a mechanical genius and a lady who can cook are welcome everywhere – and when we get bored, we pull up stakes again. We spent the last two years in South America. I think we’ll go back to Peru when we’re done here.”

“I like Peru,” said Calypso. “Latin America is nice because we both speak Spanish now.”

“And then there’s Brazil,” Leo put in. “Portuguese is weird. She learned it faster than I did. But then, she picked up Chinese, too.”

Calypso blushed. “Not all of it.”

“I wish you guys would stay a while,” Harley said. “I miss you, little big brother.” He ruffled Leo’s hair.

Leo batted his hand away. “Watch it, kid. You may be huge now, but I’ve got a dragon.”

Calypso made a thoughtful noise. “I wouldn’t mind staying for a little while. We could catch up with our old friends.”

Leo gave her a look that was half hopeful, half concerned. “You sure you don’t mind?”

“I’m sure.” She leaned in and gave him a brief peck on the lips.

“And then it’ll be back to gallivanting all over the globe again for you guys, eh?” asked Will.

“Yes, well . . .” Calypso shrugged and fidgeted with a ring on her right hand. “I spent millennia on Ogygia, never truly believing I’d find my way off. Now I’ve left it behind, but I have a mortal lifespan and . . . I want to see everything I can while I can. Maybe one day I’ll have had enough, but not just yet.”

Nico nodded. “I get that. Personally, after the last six years not having a home, I’m ready to settle down.” He looked at Will. “Although I really should go to New Rome and spend some time with Hazel and let Reyna give me that slap she owes me.”

“We can both go,” said Will. “You were right; Marko’s unquestionably ready to run the infirmary. He’ll have the chance to grow into his role, and I . . . I don’t want to miss any more time with you.”

Harper, who was hanging around in a not-so-subtle attempt to get Harley’s attention, sighed dramatically. “That’s so romantic!”

Dawn, meanwhile, had summited Mount Festus and appeared confused as to how to get down. “Nito!” she demanded.

Nico gamely fetched her down from the dragon. She went to Festus’s head, patted it and said, “Good doddie.”

 _Creak_ , Festus commented.

Leo raised an eyebrow at Will, who chuckled. “Her g’s are coming along, and all animals are doggies right now.”

“Well, I think she’s confusing my dragon. He’s pretty good with kids, though,” said Leo.

“Children see him more clearly than adults do,” said Calypso. “It’s interesting to see how people have reacted to him in different cultures. In large cities, ‘modern’ places, they don’t see him at all, but there have been places . . . we stayed in a small village in Tibet for a little while. Everyone seemed to see that he was a dragon, and they regarded his arrival as a good omen. We were able to help them with a small Yeti problem.”

“I’d say he _was_ a good omen,” said Nico, sitting back down by Will.

They talked a little while longer, mostly about Leo and Calypso’s travels. It was, for Nico, nice to be able to talk about someone else’s life for a while. Leo and Calypso had been adventuring for almost five years, ever since Leo had “graduated” from Camp Half-Blood. It sounded like they’d had a lot of fun, and a great many brushes with death.

Eventually, Nico’s wound started to pain him again. He and Will excused themselves, and Will took him to the infirmary for painkillers and salve. Sela picked up Dawn so they could have some time to themselves.

“It sounds like they’re doing their own thing,” Will commented as he treated Nico.

“Mm.” Nico sighed softly as Will rubbed salve into his back. “Maybe we could do some traveling, too, when Dawn’s old enough.”

Will leaned down teasingly close to Nico’s ear. “What happened to being ready to settle down?”

And Nico caught his hand. “As long as we’re together, I don’t care where we are.”

***

Six months later, Nico walked Hazel down the aisle at her wedding. Frank, standing under an arch in one of New Rome’s beautiful gardens, wiped tears from his face as he watched them approach. Hazel looked absolutely beautiful in her bridal gown, which was pale gold and seemed to glow.

And when the wind caught it just right, it showed the small bump just beginning to grow on her belly.

Nico kissed his sister and placed her hands in Frank’s in front of Pontifex Grace, and then he came to sit down by Will as Jason took the happy couple through their vows. Dawn clambered up into Nico’s lap.

Since the battle, Will had pondered the meaning of Rachel’s prophecy. “A father’s choice, peace at last.” Who was the father, and what was the choice? Paul was a father, but his choices had hardly brought peace. Nico thought it had to be Hades and his choice to allow Nico to reclaim his life. He’d also speculated that Will was the father – Dawn’s de facto father – and it had been his choice to call in Nico’s friends, and to try to heal him, that had brought peace. Or was bringing it, anyway; Nico wasn’t quite there yet, but he was healing every day.

Will had a different opinion, watching Nico cuddle Dawn. He believed it was Nico’s choice to become a father to Dawn, to stay and be a family with her and Will, that the prophecy spoke of.

It wasn’t easy for him, and Will was all too aware of it. Piper had a degree in family and relationship counseling, and Nico and Will were two of her clients. Nico saw her alone every week, and Will joined him every other week. Much as Nico loved Will and Dawn, it was sometimes hard for him to be around them. At one point, he’d even gone to Willa and had her draw the inhibitor ring on his hand again because his nightmares had gotten out of control, and he was afraid he could accidentally hurt Will, Dawn and Sela, who remained as Dawn’s nanny.

Piper’s wise counsel was helping him, though, and was helping them to grow as a couple and a family. There were still plenty of issues for them to work out, hurts that hadn’t quite healed, but they had made a lot of progress and were committed to each other and Dawn. Recently, they’d taken the first, tentative steps back into intimacy, and it had felt right. Nico was settling into his life and back into his own skin. Slowly, he was finding peace.

After the ceremony, at the reception, Hazel held a glass of sparkling grape juice aloft. “I propose a toast to my brother, who finally got his act together so we could have this wedding. To Nico!”

“To Nico!” everyone chorused.

Nico turned a little red, but didn’t seem put out. Hazel came over and kissed his cheek. “You realize I have to give you a bad time. It’s in my official contract as your little sister.”

Nico wrapped an arm around her and kissed her temple. “I wouldn’t have you any other way. How are you feeling?”

“Good. Most of the nausea is gone now that the first trimester is over, thank the gods.” She smiled at Will. “Thanks for the advice, by the way.”

Will laughed. “No problem. Thanks to the Great Vertigo Prank of ’13, I had to become pretty much an expert at helping people not barf. I still hold that against Markowitz.”

Hazel leaned into Nico. “So, how does becoming an uncle sound?”

“Less scary than being a father,” said Nico, looking over to where Dawn and Robbie were playing.

“You’re wonderful with her.” Hazel squeezed her brother a little. “And you’ll be wonderful with Baby Levesque-Zhang.”

“Have you thought about names at all?” Will asked.

“Hope, if it’s a girl. For a boy, we’re still discussing it.”

Will winked at her. “William is a great name. Classic. I’m just saying.”

He moved off after that, letting Nico and Hazel have a little time together. Reyna approached him, looking as regal and beautiful as ever.

“How is he?” she asked without preamble.

“Making progress.” Will fidgeted with his champagne glass. “Two steps forward, one step back a lot of the time, but he’s doing so much better now than he was even a few months ago. Piper’s really helping him.”

Reyna nodded. “So are you, I think. Without your love . . . I’m not sure he’d ever recover.”

Will swallowed against the lump in his throat. “He’ll always have it.”

Reyna set a hand on his shoulder. “Make him marry you, Will.” She kissed him on the cheek. “He doesn’t think he’s worthy of you. Show him otherwise.”

“Oh, I plan to.” Will smiled at her. “He’s not ready right now, but the moment he is, I hope you’ll be our best woman.”

“I’d better be.” She winked at Will.

Will chuckled and hugged her. He felt good this sunny afternoon, with all their friends around. Percy and Jason were bro-ing at each other while Robbie and Dawn played nearby. Piper was showing Cora, who was the most beautiful baby Will had ever seen, off to some of Hazel’s friends. Coach Hedge, Mellie and Chuck were chatting with Frank and Annabeth.

His eyes found Nico and Hazel again. They were wandering slowly away from the gathering, and Will wondered what they were discussing.

***

“You and Will need to have one of these someday soon,” Hazel said.

“Uh . . .” Nico wasn’t sure what to say to that.

She slid her arm through his. “He loves you. You love him. You’re raising a child together. Call me old-fashioned, but I think that calls for a wedding.”

Nico barked out a laugh. “You’re aware that our particular brand of ‘old-fashioned’ would faint dead away at the idea of two men getting married, right?”

“Oh, stop that!”

Nico hugged her and sighed. “I understand what you’re saying, but . . . I can’t ask him to make me any promises, not right now.”

“News flash, silly boy: He’s already made the promises. He’s committed. And so, in case you haven’t noticed, are you.” She squeezed him back. “It may just be a symbol, getting married, but it’s a powerful one.”

Nico knew she was right. He knew Will wasn’t going anywhere, and neither, for that matter, was he. But he hesitated at the idea of getting married because it was still hard for him to accept that Will had chosen him, wanted him. It was still hard to accept that this could be permanent.

He didn’t deserve Will. He knew that. But somehow, he made Will happy. That was worth staying for.

“One day. One day, we will,” he promised Hazel. “You’ll be the first to know.”

“I’d better be.”

They were approaching Temple Hill. Nico gave Hazel one last squeeze. “I’ll come back to the reception in a little while. Right now, I have something to do.”

She smiled at him. “It’s okay. Don’t be too long, though.”

Nico left her side, heading for Pluto’s temple. Just inside the door was a small bag he’d dropped there that morning. He picked it up and approached the brazier beside the altar. It burned with green Underworld flames.

He took a deep breath and began to pray. “Pluto, god of the dead, lord of the Underworld, your son comes to your altar with petitions. Hear my prayer, Father.” He drew a gold, bear-shaped pin from the bag. “For Carl Major, legacy of Mars, I pray mercy on his soul.” He placed the pin in the fire. Then he drew a dried rose from the bag. “For Juliet Robicheaux, legacy of Venus, I pray mercy on her soul.”

There were eleven Roman demigods or legacies he’d killed during the war. For each one, he placed a token in the fire, things that echoed the now-erased tattoos he’d used to remind himself of their lives – an antique coin, a hawk feather, an oak leaf and acorn, and other such things – and said a prayer. It wasn’t the first time he’d done this, and it wouldn’t be the last. He’d done the ritual at Camp Half-Blood, too, for those associated with Greek gods. He would find, purchase or create the tokens, sacrificing his time, effort or money, and burn them in the flames of Hades or Pluto while praying for their souls.

“Find a way to honor them,” Piper had advised him. “Something that feels right to you. You can’t undo what you’ve done, and you understand that. But you’re not ready to let them go, either. And that’s okay.”

In addition to his prayers to his father, Nico had lit candles at churches and made donations to houses of worship and causes that had meant something to his victims. It was his way of making restitution. Perhaps one day, he’d feel he’d done enough. Until that day, he would perform his penance and remember them.

“Don’t forget to have mercy on yourself, too,” Piper’s voice reminded him.

The last item to go in the fire was, as always, an origami angel he’d made himself. “For myself, I pray mercy on my soul.”

“Papa,” called a small voice. Nico turned to see Will and Dawn standing just outside the temple.

“She wanted to know where you were,” said Will. “I had a feeling you might be here.”

Will knew about Nico’s prayer rituals, and he was supportive. He was supportive of anything that might help Nico.

“I’m just finishing up,” Nico told him.

“Good, because the dancing’s about to start, and if you don’t dance with Hazel, she’ll slap you again and I’ll have to take you down to the infirmary.” Will smiled gently, love shining through his expression.

No, Nico didn’t deserve him. But Will made him a better person, and Nico would fight the world for that.

He turned back to the altar and bowed. “Thank you, Father.”

And then he walked out into the sunlight, where his family was waiting.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to everyone who's come with me on this angst-filled ride. I hope this ending works for you. If it does, let me know. If not, too late!
> 
> For those who've enjoyed this story, you absolutely have to read "Shadows Chasing Shadows" by Aelys_Althea. Go forthwith to my bookmarks!


	11. Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She takes a walk in Central Park, and she sees an old foe.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I realized I wanted to end this a little differently, so I wrote an epilogue to give myself closure on a couple of things.

One year after she met the Angel, Barbara is finding contentment in her life.

At first, she’d cried bitter tears over the failure of the cult. The Angel’s sudden appearance had coincided with visits from the Legion to the California group and a rash of dire warnings to the European group, and the cult had been utterly broken. Paul himself had disappeared; Barbara can only think he’s dead.

She’d spent so long invested in the idea that death was a defeatable enemy, put so much of her time, effort and money into it, that it took her months to come to term with its ending. Looking back, however, she thinks she knew all along that it was a hopeless cause. It insulated her from her grief by giving her an enemy to fight, but it was a fight destined to fail.

Even so, one good thing has come out of it: Barbara has friends now. Certainly, many disappeared after that night, but some stuck around, and they have a bond that’s hard to explain. They supported Tony through his husband’s death, and when Tony suffered a stroke shortly afterward, they were there to help him out. Barbara drove him to doctor’s appointments, Gabe and a couple of his construction buddies made some modifications to Tony’s house to make it more livable for him, and Geneva, a home health care aide, assisted him with everyday tasks and physical therapy.

In fact, Tony and Geneva had gotten along so well that he asked her to move in with him on a semi-permanent basis. She helps him in exchange for room and board, and it’s allowed her to go back to school for her nursing degree. Tony treats her like a daughter, and the affection is reciprocated.

Barbara has become close to Kellie. They take walks together, share meals a few times a week, and have lately been taking advantage of some of the cultural opportunities New York City offers. Barbara always meant to, but somehow didn’t. Not until now. She wonders why she wasted so much time.

She’s gone back to church, too. At the moment, she doesn’t know quite what she believes, but Father Stephen has always made her feel welcome, and she finds the ritual comforting.

Barbara’s also made one other, very important, addition to her life. One of the animal shelters posted a picture of a sweet, older dog named Wanda, and something about her made Barbara go down and adopt her.

She thinks it’s been her best move so far. Wanda is a gentle soul, content to sit on the couch and watch sappy Hallmark movies with her head in Barbara’s lap in the evenings. The vet says she’s still got several good years ahead of her.

It’s inevitable Wanda will die too soon, though. And yet, Barbara thinks that might be the best thing for her. She knows Wanda’s life will not be long, yet Barbara loves her, anyway. Learning to appreciate love for however long you have it is another step in her healing.

Perhaps that’s what the Angel knows. Perhaps he did her a favor.

Barbara’s walking Wanda in Central Park, enjoying a crisp autumn day, when she spots a wedding. It’s a small one, with no more than a dozen people, plus a few kids, in attendance. And, she notes, it’s two men getting married. One of them, the one whose face she can see, is blond and handsome, and the expression of love on his face tugs at her heart. She thinks about Tony, who seems more at peace every day, and quietly wishes the grooms well.

A little, strawberry-blond girl, perhaps two years old, joins the grooms. The one with his back to her kneels down and gives her something, perhaps a bracelet, and kisses her face. Then he stands again, the grooms give final responses to the officiant (who’s tall and blond and very handsome indeed), and then they kiss as their friends cheer.

One of the women in the wedding party, a beautiful brunette, has a camera, and she’s giving the grooms instructions. They turn to face her, holding the little girl between them . . .

And Barbara suddenly realizes that the dark-haired groom is the Angel. She could never forget that face.

Yet he looks different than he did that night. His face is softer, without the anger or sorrow he was carrying when she first saw him. There’s love in his face as he looks at his husband and their child.

The little girl . . . Barbara remembers what the Angel said about how his lover is raising Kayla and Paul’s child. Barbara only met Kayla a few times, but the little girl is very much her mother’s daughter. So, then, the Angel will be raising her alongside his groom.

Barbara’s tried not to think about that night too much, not to think about the cult too much. She packed it away in her mind, afraid of the emotions it could bring up.

But looking at the Angel now, married and happy, doesn’t make her angry or sad. She’s not sure what she feels, exactly, but she realizes she doesn’t hate him. He had a job to do, one he didn’t want to perform, but did, because he believed it was necessary. He could have simply killed them all. Instead, he chose to appeal to them. She remembers the passion in his voice as he spoke to them.

She guesses his gamble paid off. The cult is dead, the war over. 

She watches the group for a little while longer, from a distance. They’re mostly young, though there is one blond woman who must be the blond groom’s mother. Barbara wonders if they’re all demigods. She wonders if Kellie might recognize some of them.

They’re all happy, all affectionate toward both grooms. A small, pretty, dark-skinned girl hugs the Angel for a long time. He’s smiling.

Inevitably, as she continues watching, the Angel notices Barbara. They make eye contact. His smile fades, and even from this distance, she can see that his eyes are haunted. She realizes she has power over him at this moment. She could charge in and ruin his wedding, perhaps out him as the Angel of Death to his friends, if they don’t know what he’s done.

But she doesn’t hate him. She can’t.

Instead, she simply nods at him, a respectful gesture toward an old foe she doesn’t want to fight any longer. After a moment, he nods back.

And Barbara moves on.


End file.
